


On the Case

by Aylaar



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Auror Draco Malfoy, Auror Harry Potter, Auror Partners, Auror Training, Crime, Deputy Head Draco Malfoy, Draco Loves Cookies, Draco Rolls His Eyes Alot, Drama, Eventual Romance, Eventual Smut, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Good Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter & Ron Weasley Friendship, Head Auror Harry Potter, Kissing, Love, M/M, Minor Violence, Mutual Pining, Not Epilogue Compliant, PTSD, Panic Attacks, Pining, Pining Draco Malfoy, Pizza, Potions, Professor Neville Longbottom, Redeemed Draco Malfoy, Ron Weasley is a Good Friend, Ron Works With George, Sassy Draco, Sassy Harry, Slow Build, Slow Burn, Smut, Tea, Teasing, Trauma, Unspeakable Hermione Granger, backstories, cases, flatmates, love and friendship - Freeform, spells
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-28
Updated: 2020-03-08
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:28:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 11
Words: 34,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21995248
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aylaar/pseuds/Aylaar
Summary: Head Auror Harry Potter and his Deputy, best friend and roommate Draco Malfoy are investigating a string of crimes committed by the Celtic Serpent group. From illegal potions smuggling to murder, curses and cases, a complicated series of events unfold. Will it bring them closer together? or will they tip toe around their mutual oblivious love?*TW: some of the cases are graphic
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter, Hermione Granger/Ron Weasley, Pansy Parkinson/Blaise Zabini, Seamus Finnigan/Dean Thomas
Comments: 53
Kudos: 143





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Here I am with another fic. I hope you all like it. This one will be relatively long, spanning across several cases. There will be smut in later chapters, as well as some moderate violence and a lot of good old Auror work! Stay tuned for a bit of a wild ride. Thank you for reading <3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A massive thank you to  @mad1492  for the fantastic artwork for this fic. <3

Stood in front of a giant black and white marble podium in the middle of the Ministry of Magic, Harry Potter sighed. Two months ago, he was promoted to Head Auror and three weeks ago Ron was injured in the line of duty. They’d been auror partners since they finished training, the other Aurors had proclaimed them to be the ‘dynamic duo’ solving cases, arresting dark wizards and they were ranked best Aurors for the last five years. When Harry had been promoted to Head Auror, Ron was assigned a new partner and to his credit he was a relatively decent Auror but definitely not up to Harry’s standards. Ron and Harry had settled into a comfortable routine, they were fantastically suited to each other in every way, unfortunately whilst they were hunting down a rebel Death Eater who had intended to make his own horcruxes, Ron had gone ahead and his partner had not followed. Managing to capture the wizard, Ron also suffered deep curse damage to his right leg and he was being discharged today.

Harry never wanted his best friend discharged, he’d fought valiantly and although he was to be rewarded, the weight of losing an Auror of Ron’s caliber was a blow to the Auror team.

“Hello everyone and thank you for coming,” Harry nodded, gesturing towards his fellow colleagues, friends and family. “Unfortunately, it’s not under great circumstances. Today, we discharge Ronald Weasley with honours - Injured in the line of duty, Ronald performed fantastic work for the Auror department and Ministry of Magic throughout his time with us.” He bowed his head, pushing back the tears that threatened to surface. The curse damage to Ron’s right leg ran deep, it had taken two weeks for him to wake up, which caused deep stress and anxiety within the Weasley family, dredging up old wounds from the War, as well as scaring Hermione and Molly half to death.

“Ronald will receive his full pension, as well as a monthly retirement package, the first Auror to receive this package since it was introduced two years ago.” Harry turned his body towards Ron, who was standing next to him was definitely looking better, still stood with his cane but otherwise he was himself again. The look of sadness etched onto his face saddened Harry greatly. Nevertheless, he picked up a purple ribboned medal and placed it around his shoulders.

Turning back towards the crowd, Harry smiled as best he could and opened his mouth to speak. “The Auror department would like to offer its condolences to the family of Tracey Davis, who died in the line of duty protecting Ron. The Ministry of Magic would like to offer the family any support during these hard times.” he nodded towards the family of Tracey, who were crying. A large picture of Tracey Davis donning full Auror attire, smiling sat to the side of the marble podium. “Thank you for coming everyone, please let's take a minute of silence for our fallen comrade.” He bowed his head.

\----

After the speech had ended, Harry walked off the platform and towards the crowd, he answered several questions of reporters that had been present as best he could before he walked straight towards Hermione, who smiled warmly at him and greeted him immediately. “That was a nice speech Harry.” she placed a hand on his shoulder and gave it a gentle squeeze. “I just wish it wasn’t happening.” he admitted, shaking his head. “Mm.” she nodded.

Ron had joined him several minutes later, placing a kiss on his wife's cheek. “I was talking to George and I’m going to help him in the shop.” he announced, turning his head towards Harry who’s eyes widened. “That’s great Ron, you always said you wanted to help somehow.” he was rewarded with a grin and a slap on the back. “Yeah mate, I’m chuffed.”

“You should probably go talk to Draco, he liked Tracey.” Hermione smiled sadly, giving Harry’s shoulder another squeeze before he nodded and wandered off, in search of Draco. After a few minutes he spotted the platinum blonde hair and smiled as he walked towards his friend and roommate. “Hey, are you alright?” he bit down on his lower lip. Draco turned his head towards Harry and nodded slowly. “Yes, I’m fine.”

After the war, Draco had written letters to all of the people he’d hurt - explaining that he understood he deserved no forgiveness, but he was deeply sorry from the bottom of his heart. Harry remembered before he went back to Hogwarts for his Eighth Year receiving such a letter, tears springing to his eyes as he read it, Draco had desperately wanted to seek approval of his father. Lucius had been killed by an Auror as he was escorted to Azkaban prison, which spurred Draco in to writing the letters, no longer held back by his father. Before they’d returned to Hogwarts, Harry had returned for rebuilding and sought Draco out accepting his apology, he’d offered his own apology and they’d worked together to rebuild Hogwarts, along with Hermione and Ron, Neville, Luna, Ginny and Lavender, who had recovered well from her attack.

They become great friends over the course of the eighth year, people often commented on the weird close friendship they’d shared but neither boy really cared what other people said about them. Hermione would often find Harry sitting beside Draco as he brewed potions, or on the couch in the eighth year dorm reading to each other, she’d always suspected there was more going on than simple friendship but never pressed.

After eighth year, Hermione and Ron had moved in together - Ron had immediately proposed to Hermione. Harry moved into a flat above a Domino’s Pizza in Muggle London, just outside Diagon Alley with Draco.

Harry had been accepted into Auror training along with Draco, Ron, Lavender, Dean and Seamus. Neville had been accepted as an apprentice to Professor Sprout, Ginny had gone off to join the Holyhead Harpies, Luna was editor of the Quibbler, Hermione had joined the Department of Mysteries, which to this day none of them really knew what she did, only that she was an Unspeakable. Harry was a little disappointed that Draco wasn’t his Auror partner, but overjoyed when he’d found out he’d been assigned with Ron. Draco’s Auror partner was Tracey Davis, which he’d worked very well with. When Harry was made Head Auror, he’d asked Ron to be his Deputy, but Ron had declined the offer ‘too much paperwork mate.’ he’d said, Harry often wished he’d accepted. Instead, he’d asked Draco who agreed almost immediately. Tracey had been reassigned to Ron. Harry knew Draco had been close to Tracey, but he didn’t want to press the situation when Draco had discovered his ex-partner had been killed in the line of duty. Eventually, Draco had opened up and told him he was pretty devastated, they’d toasted her life with a bottle of Ogden’s which resulted in a hefty hangover in the morning.

“Are you sure?” Harry frowned, placing a hand on Draco’s shoulder. Biting his lip, Draco looked at the hand on his shoulder and let out a sigh. “I talked with her family, it’s weird. I spent so much time with her and now she’s gone.”

Harry nodded, it was always painful to lose a friend. A pang of guilt and sadness hit him as he thought of Fred, it had taken George a long time to accept that his twin was gone - he’d gone to see a Mind Healer in St Mungo’s for a while, he was doing relatively well now and the Wheezes shop was doing phenomenally. Though every so often, he could see that far away gaze on George’s face, Harry knew Fred would be proud of what his brother had accomplished.

Taking his hand away, Harry frowned. He’d gotten so lost in thought he blushed, realising he’d left his hand there way longer than necessary. “So what’s on the cards tonight then?” he asked casually, clearing his throat. Draco raised an eyebrow, pondered for a moment then shrugged his shoulders. “Pizza?”

“Yeah, go on then.” he agreed, a smile gracing his lips.

\-----

After the ceremony was over, Harry had said his goodbyes to his friends and apparated back to his flat with Draco. Slumping down on the L shaped sofa in the middle of the living room, he groaned and kicked his boots off under the coffee table, receiving a tsk from Draco.

“That’s not how you buy pizza, Potter.” he scowled, wandering over to the kitchen. Their apartment was a breezy open plan, although it was above a dominos Draco had worked tirelessly to extend the apartment, they’d bought it several months after renting it and it now resembled nothing of the rundown dingy place it once was. The walls were a soft cream colour, the entire flat floored with laminate. Floor to ceiling windows adorned the area, the kitchen dark wood and marble tops - Draco was proud of the kitchen, he’d learnt to cook pretty relentlessly. There were so many times Harry would come home and see Draco leaning over a cookbook, scowling and swearing about that bloody Jamie Oliver.

“Ugh you do it, I’m Head Auror I’m a busy man.” he moaned, putting his arm over his eyes in mock pain. “I’m Deputy Head Auror, I’m busy too.” Draco pointed out, clicking the kettle on. “For fuck sake Harry buy the bloody pizza before I starve to death.” Draco groaned, pulling two cups out of the cupboard overhead and placing them down on the counter beside the kettle.

“Fine.. Merlin.” Harry whined, hoisting himself up off the sofa he slipped his boots back on and frowned, looking down at his robes. “I’ll change first, don’t want to scare the muggles.” he mumbled, wandering off to the left. Draco smirked.

Kicking his door open, Harry began stripping his robes off tossing them carelessly on to the floor, he yanked his wardrobe open and pulled out a pair of jeans and a soft cream jumper. He pulled his black linen trousers off, throwing them down on top of his robes and slipped the jeans on, fastening the buttons. He stifled a yawn and pulled the jumper over his ‘Guns & Roses’ t-shirt. Slipping his vans on, he walked back through to the living room and scowled at Draco who was nursing a cup of tea between his hands.

“I’ll make you one when you get back.” Draco smiled sweetly. Harry rolled his eyes and grabbed his wallet off the coffee table. “Prick,” he mumbled. “Do you want garlic dip?”

Draco let out a short laugh and nodded his head. “Yeah, go get the pizza hangry.” he grinned, leaving his tea on the counter under a warming charm, Draco made his way to the bedroom opposite Harry’s and got changed into a pair of black jeans and a black and white striped jumper, he’d changed his socks and then left the room. He walked over to the kitchen counter and grabbed his tea, then wandered to the sofa sitting down carefully as to not spill his tea, he kicked his shoes off and levitated them over to the front door.

After about twenty minutes, Harry returned with two large pizzas, one meat feast and the other meatilicious, which was Harry’s. “I got those cookies that you like too.” he said as he kicked the door shut behind him. Draco’s eyes glistened and a wide smile appeared on his face. “Oh baby, am I glad to see you.” he let out a squeak as Harry handed him the box of hot chocolate chip cookies. Harry blushed and averted his eyes, placing both pizza boxes down on the coffee table.

“Oh honey I’m happy to see you too.” Harry teased, sitting down on the end of the sofa. Draco chuckled and grabbed the meat feast box, opening it to reveal a steaming bundle of pizza goodness. “Gods I’m so hungry.” he whined, pulling a bit of pizza out of the box.

“Never gets old.” Harry smirked, shaking his head. “What doesn’t?” Draco asked, shoveling the piece in to his mouth. There was no grace in eating pizza. “You eating pizza, Mr Pureblood pomp, gourmet extraordinaire” Harry teased again, opening his own pizza box. “Oh that’s a big word, have you been perusing that thesaurus I bought you for your birthday?” Draco teased back, winking at him.

Rolling his eyes, Harry shook his head and began to tuck in to his pizza, savouring the flavour in his mouth. “Mmm.” he moaned. Draco narrowed his eyes and picked up the pot of garlic dip, ripping the tab off it and plunging the crust of his now eaten slice into the dip.

His eyes wandered as he feasted on his pizza, stopping at the framed picture on the mantel. It was a moving picture of Harry splashing water in Draco’s face during their vacation to Miami. Hermione and Ron had accompanied them, along with Pansy and Blaise. Unsure at first, Harry had become quick friends with Blaise over their mutual like for Quidditch. Blaise worked in Gringotts as a financial advisor. He married Pansy about three months ago. Draco’s eyes moved over to another photo of him and Harry donning full tuxedos during that wedding, the photo always brought a smile to his face. Harry had been absolutely plastered when the photo was taken.

Pansy had become pretty good friends with Hermione and Luna, but Luna more than most. Being the editor of Witch Weekly, they talked a lot of shop what with Luna being the editor of the Quibbler and they liaised on quite a few articles between them.

Pictures adorned the entirety of Harry and Draco’s feature wall, really. Most of them taken during eighth year as well as Dean and Seamus’ annual eighth year reunion, which was really just an excuse for an all out piss up. The two of them had gotten together during eighth year which was really no surprise to anyone and they seemed pretty happy. Auror partners and life partners. Draco turned his head towards Harry and wondered if one day that would be the two of them, silently cursing himself over his unending crush and unrequited love.

“Where’s that tea you promised me anyway?” Harry asked through a mouthful of food. “You better not have lied about that you know, it was a deal breaker.” he grinned. Draco rolled his eyes and stood up, walking towards the kitchen. He washed his hands under the tap and set to preparing Harry a cup of tea. After he’d finished, he walked back to the sofa and handed the cup to the raven haired man, who wiped his hands on the sides of his jeans.

Draco cringed and sat down after Harry had taken the cup and began to sip. “Scruff.” Draco chided, shaking his head. Harry just grinned goofily at him and shrugged his shoulders. After they’d finished the pizzas, Draco scoffed down the cookies and groaned, rubbing his stomach. “You always do that, eat the bloody cookies and feel like shite after.”

“Mm, I’m going to bed I think.” Draco sighed, rubbing at his temples. “We have that stupid Illegal Potions shit tomorrow.” standing up, he turned to Harry who had finished his tea and placed the cup down on the coffee table. “Mm, true.”

“Night Harry.” Draco smiled, before he walked to his bedroom and closed the door softly behind him.

Watching as the other man walked to his bedroom, Harry sighed and wandlessly cleared up the mess, he wandered to his open bedroom door and turned his head towards Draco’s room. “Night Draco.” he whispered to thin air.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks everyone for the support so far!

There was a distinct difference between Draco and Harry when they got up in the morning, for one Harry would shout and swear at his alarm, whereas Draco would just turn the alarm off as he got out of bed. Harry would likely fall out of bed and after yelling obscenities for about twenty minutes, you’d hear sound of his en-suite shower. Draco was naturally always ready before Harry, even if Harry put very little effort into his outward appearance. 

Draco sat on the edge of the couch studying his fingernails as he waited for Harry, of course he could just go to work without him and he’d probably be on time every day but he always waited for him regardless. The first time he’d done it, Harry asked why he waited for him - to this day he still hasn’t answered that question and after maybe the tenth time Harry asked him, he just gave up asking. There were a lot of things they did for each other that to the outside world looked odd, but neither man really cared what the outside world thought. Smoothing down invisible lines from his Auror robes, Draco sighed. Today, Harry seemed to be taking the most amount of time a person could possibly take. 

He could hear the clanking and banging of Harry rummaging around his room, grunts and sighs. Draco stood up straight and walked towards Harry’s bedroom door, knocking lightly. “We’re going to be really late today.” he mumbled, wincing as he heard Harry curse loudly. “I can’t find my fucking wand!” Harry yelled, wrenching the door open. “It’s on the coffee table.” Draco frowned.

“Fuck!” Harry shouted, stalking out his bedroom and towards the offending coffee table, he kicked the leg and picked the wand up, holstering it. “Fucking stupid thing” he groaned, turning around to face Draco, who’d followed behind him. Draco sighed and apparated. 

Landing square in the middle of his and Harry’s giant shared office, Draco walked towards his desk and sat down on the chair, rolling forwards. He began to check the memos, frowning at a couple and scribbling a reply to most of them. One stuck out, however. It was on a pink muggle sticky note, which was immediately suspicious to Draco since through the Ministry memos you were only allowed to send official Ministry stamped parchment. 

Deciding not to pick up the note, he waited a few minutes until Harry had apparated into the office and bit his lower lip. “Harry, you know how you’re only meant to send the Ministry memos?” he started, his eyes wandering towards Harry who slumped down on his chair with a huff. “Yeah yeah I know.” he waved his hand and nodded.

“This was in my inbox and it’s a muggle sticky note.” he added. It sounded a little silly really, Draco was Deputy Head Auror and he still asked Harry about most things, of course he knew the majority of the answers but coming from a family of Death Eaters one mistake could cost him a lot more than most. He learnt early on it was better to ask questions and make sure than just wing it like Harry did. “Oh,” frowning, Harry walked forwards and peeked down at the note, his eyes widening.

“That’s that mark, hold on.” he mumbled jogging over to the stack of case files he had on his desk, he bit his lower lip in concentration as he looked for a specific file, once he found it he opened it and leafed through, looking for something in particular. “Here it is,” Harry nodded his head, walking back towards Draco he thrust the folder in his face and pointed down at the symbol on the page. “I knew I’d seen that before, you said that came through the memo system?”

Draco looked down at the folder and frowned, tracing his finger over the symbol on the page. He’d seen it before but he wasn’t sure where, before he’d seen it on the case files of course. He wracked his brain like he’d done previously and sighed, maybe he’d been dreaming it but he was sure he’d seen this particular seal on his father's desk a long time ago. Of course Lucius was dead, but it didn’t mean anything really. 

“Yes, it was in my memo pile, nobody can get through those office doors unless they’re you or me, or one of us is present when they enter.” he frowned down at the sticky note and levitated it into a spell proof clear plastic bag, sealing it at the top. “I wonder if Hermione has seen anything like this.” Draco wondered out loud, causing Harry to chuckle. “If she had she’d not tell us, Unspeakable nonsense and all that.” Draco nodded in agreement and stood up, picking the bag up. “I’ll take this through and see if there’s any curses on it and see if they can maybe trace who sent the memo.”

Harry nodded and waved him off, watching as the blonde exited the office. He sighed and looked down at his case pile, it was going to be a long day. The top folder was purple, which meant it was from their Spell Damage department, he remembered getting the folder detailing Ron’s spell damage, it was so extensive they thought he would lose the use of his leg and for the Wizarding World that was rare, especially with their advances in healing and spellwork.

He picked the folder up off the pile and opened the front page, furrowing his brow. For the last few months a symbol seemed to appear more and more often. It was a celtic cross with a snake through the middle, they still had no idea who this particular group of Dark Wizards were, they had so far found it burnt in to the wallpaper of a murder victims home, in a crop field which caused a stir with a few muggle farmers, who needed obliviated after they witnessed many robed Aurors in the middle of their field. They’d found bottles of maximum strength veritaserum in a disused warehouse stamped with such a mark. The connection was perplexing, he remembered his argument with Draco after they’d spent four hours staring at a board a picture of the crop circle, bottles and the wallpaper mark trying to connect the dots. There really was no connection between the three, but at the same time there was.

Brought out of his thoughts by the return of Draco, he looked up at the other man with a smile. Draco’s perfect hair was now mussed, which Harry had come to learn was a habit the blonde had of running his hand through it when he was stressed. It was weird to see a dishevelled Draco, he’d seen it thousands of times before but it never got old. “Problems?” he asked, raising an eyebrow at the scowl on Draco’s face.

“Couple of hours, that department is an absolute joke.” he moaned, dropping down to his office chair with a thud. “I don’t know why it takes so long for them to do anything but it bloody does”  
Harry nodded, unfortunately it was true.

“Well, we have one more connection I suppose.” Harry sighed, standing up and wandering over to his wooden cork board, he’d brought it in when they moved in to the office, he found it helped. “I still don’t get how they’re connected though.” he stared at the crop circle, it took up the majority of the field and was an absolute pain in the arse to fix. The farmer hadn’t seen anything out of the ordinary and it had occurred overnight, they’d checked all the outbuildings of the farm for clues and ran extensive traces, but it was as if nobody had ever been there. The same for the older lady who had been murdered in her home in Diagon Alley. It caused widespread panic and the Prophet had reported for weeks that the next Dark Lord was imminent, the population of the Wizarding World were never going to get over that threat, which stressed Harry to no ends. 

For weeks, reporters had stood outside the Ministry trying to get an interview with Harry - stating he had to find and neutralise the next Dark Lord as he’d done previously. He hated the hero worship and often wondered if he’d gotten his job so quickly and easily because of the fact, but he knew deep down he did incredible work. His team were the best there had been for years and their case completion rates were near impeccably fast. 

“We’ll figure it out.” Draco sighed, rooting through his paperwork. “What you got there?” asked Harry, who’d turned towards Draco and wandered over to peer over his shoulder. “Nothing interesting, holiday requests.” he shrugged, pulling out his quill from the drawer in his desk. For holiday requests, there was a special quill and ink in scarlet red, they’d changed the procedure after Aurors were caught forging holiday documents for extra time off. 

“Who’s requesting holiday this time then?” Harry asked casually, walking back over to the corkboard. He frowned and stared at the crop circle, he knew there was something that he was missing but he just couldn’t place his finger on it.

“Uh, Robards weirdly enough.” Draco laughed and signed the document accepting his holiday leave. Robards was only a part timer now, after his position had been filled by Harry. The Auror seemed grateful Harry hadn’t asked him to become his deputy, they never did decline any of his requests for leave - during the course of their training Robards assisted with many cases, and saved their hides just as many times. Harry believed it was duty other than actual care - the man was grumpy and drove Harry round the bend most of the time. 

“Didn’t he just request holiday last month?” asked Harry, frowning. His concentration was fixed to the crop circle, he barely heard Draco’s reply of “Yes, a week.” Harry then spun around fast his gaze snapping to Draco’s face. “Murder is murder, illegal potions are illegal.” he said slowly. Draco raised an eyebrow and smirked “Generally yes, fantastic thinking there, Potter.” he chuckled.

“No, I mean, the crop circle doesn’t really tie in to illegal activity, unless they were doing something in that particular field and they had to cover it up, so they burnt the crop circle in to the field.” Harry bit down on his lower lip and jogged over to his desk leafing through some of the paperwork on his desk. Pulling out the sheet he was looking for his eyes skimmed the words until it landed on what he was looking for. “Yeah, here, look.” he held the sheet up and jogged over to Draco’s desk thrusting the parchment into his hands. 

Draco looked down at the parchment and read the words, his eyes widening. “The warehouse was clean of fingerprints, dna and spell traces, except for one crate of maximum strength veratiserum.” Draco read aloud. “The house was clean of fingerprints, dna and spell traces, except for the wall which was burnt with the celtic serpent mark.” 

“Each place had one thing left, the mark, the body, the veratiserum.” Harry stated. “We missed something.” Draco whispered.

\--------------

After briefing their team on their findings, Draco, Harry and Seamus apparated into the middle of the field. They’d cleaned the area and obliviated the farm owners, but they’d definitely missed something. The outbuildings were clear, which frustrated Harry to no ends, but they’d definitely missed something. “What could it be?” asked Seamus, who had immediately started casting to detect spell traces. “No idea.” Harry sighed.

Draco ran his hand through his hair and looked around the area, there was nothing out of the ordinary, the wheat field was high enough so the farmers wouldn’t notice them in the middle, the nearest building an old dilapidated barn, beside that a horse stable and to the far left the farmhouse itself. Biting down on his lower lip, Harry went through a mental checklist of where they’d looked at the last time they were here. 

“We checked the barn, the farmhouse and the stables.” he noted. Over to the right there was a vast forest stretching across the entire area, which meant to the left where a dirt track led from the farmhouse to the outside road was the only way to get in or out with a vehicle. Of course that didn’t apply to wizards, but Harry wondered about the forest. “Did anyone check the outskirts of that forest?” Harry asked, pointing over yonder. Draco followed his finger and frowned, shaking his head. He looked down at the piece of parchment he’d brought with him eyes skimming the checklist. “No, they checked the boundary of the field, the barn, farmhouse and stables, the only things that weren’t checked were the cellar to the south of the farmhouse and the forest area, they checked the main road and the stretch of their dirt track, the vehicles outside, the combine and the tractor.” 

Harry groaned and peered down at the parchment in Draco’s hands. Seamus turned to the two men and walked forwards. “There’s faint spell traces here, they lead off to the edge of the field. Maybe a few days old, they’ve definitely been back whoever it was that was here.” 

Harry nodded and rubbed the side of his face, taking in a deep breath. “Okay then, let’s check the forest boundary. I doubt there would be any blueprints to that forest, unless there was maybe a cabin in the middle or something.” 

“Sounds like a horror movie.” mumbled Seamus, who looked a little green at the prospect of a scary cabin being in the middle of the forest. “Oh god, I hated that movie.” Draco moaned, shaking his head. Himself and Harry had rented a dvd from a nearby muggle video store called “The Cabin in the Woods” which scared Draco half to death, Harry on the other hand had laughed at his reaction and stated all horror movies were essentially the same plot. Draco was having absolutely none of it at the time though.

“You hated Drag Me to Hell more though.” Harry smirked, they began to walk together towards the forest boundary keeping an eye out for any movements, though all they’d noticed were a few birds and a deer poking its head out of the trees. “That one was pretty bad, that crazy gypsy lady? I wouldn’t have said no to her, Merlin.” Draco sighed, shaking his head at the memory. “I don’t know why you insist on watching those movies, I much preferred Titanic.” Draco stated, narrowing his eyes at the raven haired man.

“That’s because you’re a bit of a sap” Seamus smirked, causing Draco to glower at him. “I am not, that one is full of tragedy!” he stated. “My entire life is a tragedy, I want something scary.” Harry smirked, shaking his head at Draco’s reaction. “You’re scary enough.” Draco scowled.

A glimpse of green light had Harry immediately draw his wand from it’s holster, alerting the other two who followed suit quickly after. “Did you see that?” Harry whispered, inching closer to Draco who nodded. “Seamus, left - I’ll go in first, Draco to the right.” they all nodded in unison and Harry began walking forwards, quickly disappearing through the trees. Seamus walked off to the left and crouched down, eyes scanning the forest floor. He began casting for spell traces again, his eyes landing on a steady flow of magic leading further into the forest. He inwardly groaned as he stood up, quietly walking in to the forest clearing. 

Draco walked off to the right, immediately walking through the high tree trunks, branches, leaves and twigs crunching under his boots. He quickly cast a silencing charm on his feet and stealthily jogged through the forest, his eyes scanning for any signs of movement. 

Harry had wandered a little further than he’d previously intended but he was convinced he’d seen the dark figure of someone running through the forest. He heard a rustle behind him and turned around swiftly, his eyes settling on Seamus who looked at him sheepishly. “Sorry I didn’t know where I was going, everything looks the bloody same.” he whispered, Harry nodded in agreement and motioned to the north. Seamus nodded too. “Have you seen Draco?” Harry whispered back, scanning the area. “No, not yet mate.” he whispered back. 

They began to walk forwards slowly, making sure they made as little noise as possible. When they stopped, their eyes settled on a small wooden hunting cabin in the middle of the forest. Hearing a yelp from the right of him, Harry quickly turned, his eyes darting around wildly. “Expelliarmus!” a voice Harry immediately recognised as Draco’s shouted, Harry began bounding towards the noise, Seamus following behind him.

“Crucio!” an unidentified voice screamed, it was definitely male. “Stupefy!” Draco shouted, once Harry had spotted Draco, his head turned towards the attacker, donning full black robes and a hood that mostly covered his face, Harry cursed under his breath. 

Another hooded figure turned up, Seamus found himself immediately duelling the new figure, curses began flying back and forth the steady stream of magic illuminating the area. Harry moved up behind Draco and pointed his wand towards the attacker, from this angle he could see the man's face a little better. He had blue eyes, pointy features - he didn’t recognise the man but maybe Draco would. 

Draco moved away from Harry and towards Seamus, spotting a figure in the corner of his eye Draco pointed his wand to the third hooded figure, who began screaming “LEAVE, NOW.” in a thick Irish accent. The hooded figure duelling Seamus immediately disapparated, furious, Seamus swung round to the man Harry was currently duelling, who with a sadistic smirk also disapparated. Draco, caught unawares was hit by a stupefy propelling him through the air and down onto the forest floor with a thud. Harry’s eyes widened, the third figure quickly disapparated. Seamus immediately began setting up traces and Harry ran to Draco’s side. Groaning, Draco stood up slowly and gave a sheepish smile to Harry. “Caught me off guard.” he winced, he quickly cast episkey on his finger which was bent the wrong way and he groaned as the hot feeling enveloped his finger, before snapping back into place.

He was immediately rewarded with a bone crushing hug from his partner, his eyes widened he then smiled softly and wrapped his arms around Harry’s waist. “I’m alright, let me go before you break more bones than I can heal.” Draco scolded. 

“Sorry.” Harry said sheepishly, pulling back from the hug. A blush stained his cheeks, he turned quickly towards Seamus and ran a hand through his hair. “Anything?”  
  
Seamus shook his head and sighed. “No, but I don’t think they expected us to be here this time, we could check out the cabin.” Harry frowned and thought for a moment, before shaking his head. “Ward the area and shut it down, we need to see if there’s any curses active here before we go poking about.” Seamus nodded and stood up.

After the three of them had securely warded the area and set up boundaries so they’d be alerted if anyone apparated or disapparated nearby, the three of them apparated to the Ministry to report their findings.

“You were right at least.” Draco smiled, looking up into Harry’s eyes. “We’ll get them, don’t worry.” Harry looked back, they maintained eye contact for around fifteen seconds, before Harry broke contact and cleared his throat. “I know, we’ll do it together.” he whispered, walking towards the Ministers office.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's chapter 3. Hope you're enjoying the story so far, thank you for the kudos and comments, they mean the world to me. <3

When Harry, Draco and Seamus had returned to the Ministry, Harry had immediately sought out Kingsley to brief him on their findings. Draco had gone back to the office to write out their field report, after asking Seamus to go down to spell damage and ask about the sticky note he’d received earlier. Upon walking through the door to the Ministers office, Harry’s eyes rested on Robards and Dean, who was sitting awkwardly in the high backed chair in front of Kingsley’s desk.

“Ah, Potter.” Kingsley nodded, gesturing towards the empty chair beside Dean. Harry crossed the space of the office and quietly sat in the chair, resting both arms on the armrests. “Kingsley.” he greeted, nodding his head in return. Dean turned his head towards Harry and grimaced, Harry frowned. “What’s happened?” curious, Harry turned his attention back to the Minister, running a hand through his hair.

“Auror Lockwood.” Dean sighed, averting his eyes. Kingsley smoothed his hand over a piece of parchment neatly placed in the center of his desk and let out a breath. “Auror Lockwood set fire to his desk, then hit three other Auror’s with an unknown curse, before fleeing the scene.” Kingsley bit out, he looked frustrated and not his usual composed self, which made Harry a little nervous.

“Before he left, however. He burnt a mark in to his desk.” Kingsley held up a photograph of the celtic serpent, his eyes studying Harry with intent. Harry’s eyes widened, he stood up and leant over to take the picture. Studying the mark, it was definitely the same mark they’d encountered recently, not a piece out of place. Harry would know, he’d spent the better part of hours and hours studying that blasted mark.

“Do we have any idea who they are?” asked Dean, who had been uncharacteristically quiet. Harry shook his head and let out a groan. Sitting back down on the armchair, he was hunched forwards, brow furrowed. After a few minutes, his eyes rose to meet Kingsley’s. “Well, I better fill you in on what we just encountered. 

Harry then began to explain to Kingsley and Dean about the crop circle, what led up to them investigating, the boundary, forest and cabin they’d encountered whilst they were out on the field. Kingsley asked very few questions and Dean stayed silent throughout, only nodding when he heard keywords. After Harry had stopped talking, Dean turned to him and cleared his throat. “Is, er, is Seamus alright mate?” he asked, a blush raising up his neck. Harry let out a laugh and nodded. “Of course, he’s a good Auror.” 

“Well, dismissed. I want to read that report when Auror Malfoy is finished with it.” Kingsley said tightly, gesturing towards the door. Harry and Dean took that as their queue and exited quickly, letting out a breath. Although Harry and Kingsley shared a decent relationship, when they were in work the other man held himself well, and to his credit was a little terrifying sometimes. “I’m going to find Seamus.” Dean muttered, before swiftly jogging in the opposite direction. Harry watched him go and smiled fondly, then made his way back to his office.

“Hey.” Harry sighed as he walked through their office door, Draco’s head rose and he bit his lower lip, waiting for the other man to speak. Sitting down at his desk he filled Draco in on the meeting he’d had with Kingsley, after he was finished speaking Draco was rubbing his chin thoughtfully. “Lockwood hm?” he frowned. “He was quiet, but I never expected that of him.” Harry nodded in agreement, his eyes resting on the corkboard. “Well, we have the warehouse, the murder scene, the crop circle/forest cabin and Lockwoods desk now.” Harry noted, standing up he stretched out and rolled his neck, trying to relieve the building tension. His shoulder made a loud clicking noise and he grunted in response.

“You’re getting old.” Draco smirked, standing up. He brushed down his Auror’s robes and wandered over to the corkboard, he then began pinning a copy of the report he’d made on the cabin, as well as a picture of the sticky note and turned his head towards Harry. “Seamus came back whilst you were away, spell damage reported nothing out of the ordinary, though they did trace the sticky note to Lockwoods desk.” he sighed. 

“That’ll be why he did it then.” Harry suspected, ignoring Draco’s jibe about his age. Padding over to him, he felt a weird bubbling sensation in the pit of his stomach. He’d spent so much time staring at three photographs - now that there was more information he knew he’d spend more hours agonising over the same thing. Though, at least they were making some sort of progress. “I assume so.” Draco agreed, chewing on his lower lip. Harry noted that Draco’s hair was more mussed than usual, he wondered how many times he’d ran his hand through his hair whilst he wrote out the field report. He chuckled lightly. “Mm?” asked Draco, still staring at the corkboard in front of them.

“Nothing.” Harry replied simply, turning his body towards his desk. “Right well, I briefed Kingsley, you did the field report, we’ve sorted the evidence out. I’ll ask Dean and Seamus to assist Auror Endelton to the Cabin for investigation, I’ll ask someone from spell damage to go with them just incase,” he ran a hand through his hair, he seemed to be picking the habit up from Draco. “If you go down to International and maybe see if they’ve reported any of the Celtic Serpent group in their countries, maybe we can figure out if it’s worldwide, uh.” he trailed off, frowning. Draco stood still, listening to Harry intently, he nodded his head in agreement and waited. “I’ll speak to Hermione, I know the Unspeakables can’t tell us anything but if we share it with the Department of Mysteries maybe they won’t be so…”

Draco smirked. “Mysterious?” Harry chuckled and nodded. “Yeah, I doubt it though.” he sighed. Draco simply shrugged his shoulders and exited the office, making his way to the Department of International Magical Cooperation. He hated going to that particular department, the filing witch Hestia was an absolute heathen, in his opinion. The woman loved nothing more than making his life a misery. He’d stand there as she shuffled papers about, messed about with her quill, straightened her robes, ignored him, grunted. He could feel the waves of irritation wash over him as he walked through the corridors of the Ministry.

Harry held back in the office for another few moments, composing himself before he exited the office and walked towards his Auror team, gathering Endelton, Seamus and Dean. “Right, I need you three to sort out that cabin, I trust you to do a thorough investigation. I’ll ask spell damage to assist as well, just in case they’ve left any nasty curses there. I want a full report on my desk in the morning.” He looked over to Endelton, who was nodding his head a little more eagerly than Harry could stomach. Joshua Endelton had been a part of Harry’s Auror team for about two years now, he’d aced training and he was a very competent Auror, but he was one of the most irritating Auror’s he’d ever come to know. The man really didn’t know when to shut up, his humor was inappropriate at the best of times and he was a chronic oversharer. 

“Right you are.” Seamus nodded, turning his head to Dean who smiled at him. Harry often wished he had the relationship they shared, he wondered sometimes when he was laying in bed if one day he would have that with Draco, but he was really too scared to make the first move. Their friendship was comfortable and he didn’t want to do anything to ruin that. Nodding, Harry wandered off back to his office, closing the door behind him. He needed to get the necessary paperwork duplicated and right before he headed down to the Department of Mysteries. Although he knew Hermione wouldn’t protest, Unspeakable Wilson drove him to his wits end.

After he finished duplicating the paperwork, he sent a quick memo to Spell Damage to assist and he gathered everything up and took a deep breath - flexing his hands, he opened the office door and frowned, on the other side stood a very nervous looking Lavender Brown. “Brown, what’s up?” 

“Hi, er,” she looked a little uncomfortable, narrowing her eyes she took in a deep breath. Harry always felt uncomfortable looking at Lavender, she had deep gouging claw-like scars that started at the top of her eyebrow to the bottom of her chin, no matter how many years passed they were always red as though it had been yesterday they were done. A result of the war, she’d suffered badly after the war was over, but returned to Hogwarts for her eighth year like the rest of them. A brave girl, with outstanding marks she was another Auror that aced her training and deserved a spot on Harry’s team. Gone was the chattery girl she once was, now quiet and reserved. Harry knew she shared a flat with Pavarti and Padma, but he really knew little else about her apart from what he’d learnt during Hogwarts.

“I wondered if maybe I could assist with the cabin?” she asked quietly, looking down at her feet. Harry thought for a moment, but shook his head. “Actually, I have another task for you - I need you and Henderson to go to the murder victims house, we found something at the crop circle area, I want to double check all the areas just in case we missed something there too.” Lavender’s eyes widened and she nodded. “Yes sir, does that mean we’ll be going back to the warehouse too?” she asked hesitantly. Harry thought for a moment then nodded slowly. “Yes, I still have the warehouse secured, but that’ll be tomorrow now.”

Lavender nodded in agreement and bowed her head. “I’ll go find Henderson now, sir.” she mumbled, before turning on her heel and jogging off towards her desk. Harry watched her retreating figure and smiled slightly. Always eager to help out any way she could, Harry wondered if the war was the reason for her tenacity. Shaking his head, he tried to clear his mind of errant thoughts of the war and made his way down to the Department of Mysteries.

\---------------

“Harry!” Hermione called, running towards him full pelt. “What’re you doing here?” she asked curiously, a frown on her face. Harry had walked in to the Department of Mysteries ten minutes ago and spent that entire ten minutes arguing with the witch on the desk. Every time he came here, same with International Cooperation he had issues with the staff. He wondered if Kingsley purposely hired people for these desks just to piss him off.

“Hermione.” he sighed, a breath of relief. “I know, before you say - that you can’t tell me anything that happens here,” he started, narrowing his eyes and glaring at the witch on the desk. “But I have some information to share, just in case you’ve come across it to.” 

Hermione looked thoughtful, before nodding her head and gesturing towards a small office room to the left of them. Once inside, he caught her in the corner of his eye motioning outside. Sighing, he placed the parchment and photograph down on the table before him and turned around, inwardly groaning at the sight of Unspeakable Wilson. 

“Head Auror.” Wilson greeted, swishing round the room with her charcoal black robes, her posture and swish was something even Snape would be envious of. “Unspeakable.” he nodded. Hermione closed the door behind her and walked around to the other side of the table, taking a seat next to Unspeakable Wilson.

Harry always felt like he was being interrogated every time he came here, he was always on what he labelled as ‘the wrong side of the table’ “There’s an organization we’ve been tracking and investigating, we don’t know their official name so we’ve dubbed them the Celtic Serpent,” he started, picking up the photograph he slid it along the table for the two of them to look at. Hermione’s eyes scanned the photograph, then raised to meet his. Although she’d been his friend since he was eleven, she really didn’t give anything away in her facial expression, neither Unspeakable Wilson, who he still didn’t know the first name of.

“We’ve so far found the marks in a murder victims house, burnt to the wall,” he slid the parchment over detailing the field report when they’d discovered the victims corpse, as well as a detailed report of the Celtic Serpent burnt in to the wall. “A warehouse, holding maximum strength veratiserum, the mark was on the bottles - area clear of any traces.” he slid the parchment over for that too. Hermione's eyes were scanning the first piece, though he noted she re-read one part of the report. Harry had read that same report many times, to know she was reading the part about the scorch marks still being as hot as fiendfyre when they arrived. So hot, it burnt Endelton's fingertips when he’d tried to touch it. Something Harry berated him about for days, it wasn’t good practice to touch something before you knew whether it was cursed.  
“A crop circle, in a farmer's field in North Yorkshire.” he passed over the photograph of the crop circle, Unspeakable Wilson was reading the report about the warehouse, but she gave nothing away whatsoever. “We went back to that scene and found three perps in full black cloaks outside a cabin in the nearby forest.” Hermione pursed her lips and nodded.

“Finally, Auror Lockwood earlier today set his desk on fire, scorching the Celtic Serpent in to it before hexing a few others and fleeing the scene.”

Hermione frowned at this, but nodded again nevertheless. “Interesting.” she said simply. “Do you mind if we keep these copies?” 

Harry shook his head “They’re duplicates, for you.” 

Tapping her fingernails against the desk, Unspeakable Wilson gathered the paperwork up and waved her wand, they instantly disappeared. Harry didn’t bother asking. “Like I say, I know you can’t talk about anything you do, but in the interest of cooperation and catching these guys I thought it was important to share it with you.” 

Unspeakable Wilson snorted, but nodded. Hermione rolled her eyes and stood up, smiling at Harry. “Thank you, if we find anything shareable we will let you know.” Wilson stood up and exited quickly, robes billowing behind her.

“Merlin she’s a delight isn’t she?” he mumbled, shaking his head. Hermione just chuckled. “She’s lovely actually.”

\----------------------------

A quick chat with Hermione, and Harry was on his way back to his office with what was the onset of a migraine. He could feel it pounding against his temples. He stopped as he entered his department, raising an eyebrow as Robards stood over Lockwood’s desk, eyeing it suspiciously. “Everything alright?” Harry asked, walking towards the older Auror. “Hm, fine.” he huffed out, walking away from Harry. Looking down at the desk, Harry noted that it was encased in a warding spell, he could feel the delicate tingle of magic wash over him as he got closer. He mentally filed weird the encounter in his ‘weird things Robards does’ area of his mind, before entering the office to find an impatient Draco. 

“Right well I went down to cooperation - they were as fucking useless as they ever have been, they sent out a fucking memo to Major Crimes and said we’ll find out when we find out.” Draco grumbled.

Harry chuckled and shut the door behind him. “I went to the Department of Mysteries, showed them our paperwork, got a scowl off Wilson and came back here.” he countered, slamming down on to his office chair.

“So seems like we have had a super productive day then.” Draco scowled. Harry nodded and leant back in his chair, letting out a breath. “What do you fancy for dinner tonight?” Harry asked, mentally going through their list of choices. They couldn’t have Dominos two days in a row, although Harry wouldn’t protest Draco certainly would.

“Chinese?” suggested Draco, who was now slumped in his chair - Harry always wished he had the posture and elegance Draco had, even when he was slouching - he always made it look so effortless, so perfect. “Mm, alright.” agreed Harry. 

When their reports were filed and everyone had cleared off, Harry held out his hand for Draco, who blushed lightly. “Chinese, tea, bed.” he smiled. Draco took his hand and smiled in return, before Harry side-alonged the two of them into the middle of their living room. 

\---------------------

“Hey can I get a delivery please?” Harry asked in to the white, rectangular phone in his left hand, held up to his ear. Draco really didn’t get along with Muggle technology all that well, when Harry had insisted he order the last Chinese takeaway Draco had spent that much time figuring out how to use the bloody thing the other man had gotten frustrated and just did it himself, which caused an argument that lasted until the guy knocked on their door with food.

“Yeah, it’s Harry, yeah.” he sat on the edge of the sofa, now wearing a blue t-shirt with a picture of an eagle on it and a pair of black jogging bottoms, his socks pulled over the bottoms of the joggers. Harry often felt the cold, which amused Draco since he always felt like he was on bloody fire. “Yeah usual place, er - can I get two chicken chow meins, some chicken balls with barbeque sauce,” he looked over to Draco, who was nursing a cup of tea and leaning casually against the island counter in their kitchen. Draco had also changed into a pair of soft black linen trousers and a long-sleeved green top. Harry mouthed ‘do you want the chicken stuff?’ to Draco, who nodded in agreement.

“Err, yeah, can I get the smoked chicken too?” he asked, biting his lip. A smile appeared on his face and he nodded, although nobody but Draco could see it. “Yeah, cheers mate, see you.” he said, before clicking the button on the phone and tossing it down gently to the end table at the side of their sofa.

“Said about twenty minutes.” he mumbled, walking towards the kitchen. He picked up his cup of tea Draco had made him and sipped on it, his eyes rolling in delight. “Merlin you make a sexy cuppa.” Draco snorted. “Well at least something about me is sexy.” Draco muttered, walking towards the sofa. “Hey I didn’t say that was the only thing!” Harry laughed.

“Oh, what else then?” Draco challenged, turning round to face the other man. His eyes sparkled, a smirk on his face as he waited for Harry’s response. Harry could feel a blush rising on his face, he ducked down and shook his head. “Nevermind” he mumbled, quietly making his way to the sofa and plonking down onto it, spilling his tea a little on his lap as he did so. 

Draco let it go and sat down beside him, smiling. “Well I know it didn’t seem like it, but we’re getting somewhere.” he said, trying to diffuse the tension. “Yeah I s’pose.” Harry sighed, glugging down the rest of his tea and discarding the cup on the coffee table in front.

They sat in relative silence, the only sound that could be heard was Harry’s heavy breathing and the sound of birds outside their windows. Knocked out of his musings, Draco’s eyes wandered to the door and the faint sound of knocking from the other side. 

“That’ll be the food.” Harry said lamely. Stood up, he walked to the door and opened it, grinning at the delivery boy stood before him. “Hiya Harry, here’s your food.” This particular delivery driver had been Harry and Draco’s favourite since they moved in. The first piece of mail they’d gotten was a menu to this particular Chinese takeaway and they’d immediately gone - Draco said it was simply ‘not polite’ to ignore mail, Harry had tried to tell him that if they answered every piece of junk mail they’d ever get they’d never have any time for anything else but Draco on this occasion had been too hard to reason with.

“Heya Glen, thanks mate.” he reached over to the small telephone table stood beside the door and fished through it for the bank notes he left in there, purposely for the Chinese. Taking the bag, he held out the money to Glen, tipping him an extra £10. Glen winked at him and waved a hand towards Draco, who was watching with interest.

Although Draco liked Glen, he couldn’t help but feel every time he came he flirted with Harry, sometimes it was a wink, a playful shove of the shoulder, their eyes would meet longer than Draco liked. He knew it wasn’t his place to be jealous or stop his friend from being with someone, but he’d never really saw Harry with anyone before and the thought of doing so made him feel nauseous and uneasy. “Hi Glen.” he said, nodding his head towards the boy. He was maybe about twenty four years old, dark black hair and eyes as blue as the ocean. He wasn’t bad to look at and you could tell he went to the Gym. Curses, Draco thought. He really didn’t stand a chance did he?

“Well see you next time Harry, don’t be a stranger.” he winked, before making his way off down the stairs. Harry closed the door behind him and padded over to the coffee table, dishing out the many containers, tossing the prawn crackers down wherever. Neither him nor Draco liked them, but they came free every time they ordered. “Mm, so hungry.” Harry moaned. He accio’d a couple forks and passed one to Draco. 

They turned the small tv on to the left of their false fireplace. Draco seemed to enjoy the many animal themed documentaries, so Harry made the effort and bought Sky TV, just so Draco could watch them on the National Geographic. He’d never forget the look of glee on Draco’s face as he came home and found the new ‘weird lighty up box thing’ as he called it sitting to the side of their television. 

“What we watching today?” Harry asked, squinting at the screen. His box of chow mein had been so hot it steamed his glasses up. “Something about dolphins.” Draco mumbled in response, sticking his fork into the clear plastic container. “Cool.”

After they’d finished their food and were thoroughly stuffed, Harry shifted on the sofa to relieve the tension in his stomach and ended up with his head on Draco’s shoulder. No word of protest from the other man, he held it there and closed his eyes gently, marveling in being so close to him. Draco always smelled amazing, even after he’d been on the field for hours and sweated up a storm. Ron had once made a comment on how Draco smelt after he’d been working all day - to which Luna had said she read in the Muggle magazine Cosmopolitan that if you enjoyed the smell of someone’s sweat it meant you were physically compatible. Harry had blushed scarlet and Draco had avoided his gaze for several hours after. 

Absentmindedly, Draco began running his hands through Harry’s hair, which earned a noise of satisfaction from Harry, who was now half asleep. Looking down at the sleepy man beside him, Draco let himself believe in the fantasy of being the person Harry loved, even if for a moment.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, here I am with another chapter. Sorry it's a little late. I hope you enjoy it. This one is more relationship development, but there is a nice little case element too.

At around midnight, Draco had finished watching his dolphin program, then he went on to an animal rescue program after that - he was watching a dog that had been abandoned by some rather vile muggles in his opinion, nothing to do with their status as one would have once thought. When they’d received the dog it had severe starvation, as well as a few diseases. The program was called Animal Cops Houston. Draco was lucky Harry was asleep next to him his head on Draco’s shoulder because he would have laughed at Draco’s tears. The truth was, he really didn’t want to move. It was so nice having Harry so close to him, he needed to go to the bathroom about two hours ago but he held it just for the closeness. It was funny, he knew the pining was ridiculous but it seemed like they went through this endless cycle of never dating anyone else, yet dancing around each other. Draco wondered often if it worked both ways, sometimes he’d see a faraway look in Harry’s eyes, or he’d hold his gaze for a little longer than a friend would, or maybe he’d smile at him, that soft loving smile.

Maybe Draco was just overthinking it, like he usually did. He inwardly cursed himself - he always did this. If Harry had an ounce of interest in him he’d have told him years ago, after all he had the Gryffindor courage, not Draco. Sighing, he nudged Harry gently. They had work tomorrow and he knew if he let him sleep on the sofa he’d have a cranky Harry in the morning. The last time they’d done this he’d woken up with a stiff neck and he’d never stopped banging on about it all day. It drove Draco around the twist.

“Mmm?” Harry mumbled, sleepily. Draco smiled at the other man, his head was still on his shoulder, but he’d somehow wrapped his arm around Draco’s waist, he’d not noticed before. He bit down on his lip and braced himself for the awkward moment he was about to have, but it never came. “What time is it?” Harry asked, moving closer to Draco, if that was even possible.

“It’s midnight.” Draco whispered, his heartbeat sped up and a wave of nausea hit him like a truck. Did Harry realise what he was doing? What if he did? Before Draco could go into full on panic mode, Harry removed his arm from his waist and looked up at Draco, he looked like he was contemplating something, something flickered past his features that he couldn’t quite put his finger on. “Should probably go to bed then.” Harry yawned, stretching out. “Have you seen my pyjamas by the way? The snitch ones, I can’t find them.” he stood up, wandering over to the kitchen. Draco heard the click of the kettle and frowned, Harry didn’t usually drink tea this late.

“Oh, no I haven’t.” he replied, standing up. Picking the cups up off the coffee table, he walked the stretch to the kitchen and dumped the mugs in the sink, his eyes moving to Harry, who looked as though he could barely keep his eyes open. “You having tea?” 

“Mm, no. I’m err..” Harry frowned at the kettle and then turned to Draco giving him a sheepish smile. “I don’t know what I’m doing, I’m absolutely knackered.” he sighed “I’m not sleeping well, nightmares again.” 

Draco frowned and nodded, he had his fair share of nightmares, mostly to do with Voldemort or the War itself, but they still haunted him. He was sure they always would. Though he’d heard everything there was to know about Harry’s perspective, he would’ve thought Harry’s nightmares would be worse. When they were in Auror training Harry’s nightmares were so bad he had to lay next to him just to stop him from thrashing about. Draco thought about it for a moment, Harry was more important than his pride. He conceded.

“Do you want to sleep with me?” he asked, cringing at the way he worded it. Eloquent Malfoy, eloquent, he thought.

Harry looked at him for a moment, as though he was thinking about it before nodding slowly. He smiled at Draco and placed a hand on his forearm. “Thanks, that would be good.”

Draco nodded and gestured towards his bedroom, he began to walk to the door faltering as he went to turn the handle, they hadn’t done this for a long time and Draco wasn’t sure he felt the same way about Harry as he did in Auror training, sure they’d always been close but it had accelerated over the years. “The tea wouldn’t have helped,” he said, almost a whisper before opening the door and walking inside. Not quite sure why he said that, maybe to stop how awkward he felt. “You need your pyjamas?” he asked, turning to Harry. 

Harry stood at the doorway, his eyes scanning Draco’s bedroom. It didn’t really look much different to when they’d originally decorated it, there were odd things that was different. Draco had insisted on the four poster bed stood proud in the middle of his back wall, an amethyst canopy draped elegantly over the dark stain wood, Harry smiled. He had assumed Draco would choose green but when they chose the colours he was impressed. Draco’s walls were cream coloured and his carpet the same shade of purple as his canopy. He’d chosen not to have curtains round the bed, however. A plush white rug sat to the right of his bed and the entire right wall was dedicated to Draco’s in built wardrobes, a giant floor length mirror attached at the middle.

Harry’s bedroom was definitely not as impressive. He walked in and closed the door behind him, shaking his head in response. Pulling his t-shirt over his head, he threw it down on to the floor and pulled his joggers down, stood only in his boxers. Draco blushed darkly, luckily there was very little light in his bedroom - Harry would probably not notice. Draco followed suit and threw his clothes on top of Harry’s. It felt intimate somehow, but regardless he padded over to the right side of the bed and pulled back the duvet.

“Probably a long day tomorrow.” Draco mused, crawling into bed. He pulled the duvet cover up to his chin and turned his head, watching as Harry stood by the foot of the bed, he wondered if he was actually going to get in or not, but he was surprised when Harry walked around the bed and slipped under the covers too. Draco turned his head back and stared at the ceiling. He wasn’t really sure he’d actually get enough sleep with Harry next to him.

Beside him, Harry didn’t feel any better. He’d been surprised when Draco suggested sleeping with him. Admittedly his mind drifted to other things ‘sleeping with’ meant, he had to turn away to hide the blush that rose up his neck, staining his cheeks. If he was honest with himself he’d often thought about Draco in.. Certain sexual terms. Rolling his eyes, he turned his head and looked over at the other man. Shifting closer to Draco, he wrapped his arm around Draco’s waist and rested his head on Draco’s chest. Hoping it wasn’t crossing a line, he waited for a moment but when he heard no response from Draco he bit his lower lip. “I hope this is okay.” he whispered, he felt awkward.

Draco nodded. “Yeah.” he let out breathily. He brought his left arm up and linked his fingers with Harry’s, there was absolutely no way two friends would act like this, but Draco could neither ask him whether he liked him too, nor ask what the bloody hell was happening. A few moments passed and Draco felt his eyes droop, it didn’t take him long to drift off to sleep.

Harry, on the other hand was having a few more problems than Draco, he heard the soft rise and fall of Draco’s breathing. He rubbed his thumb in a circular motion around the back of Draco’s hand, he felt restless. If he went to sleep, he’d miss an entire night of this.

But after twenty minutes, Harry was asleep too.

\-------------------------

The obnoxious sound of Draco’s alarm clock beeping woke Harry up from his peaceful sleep. Admittedly the most peaceful sleep he’d had since well, probably the last time he’d slept with Draco beside him. He opened his eyes and squinted at the clock, it was 6:45. That was why Draco was always ready before him he thought. Nobody needed to be up at 6:45. They didn’t start work until 8:30.

Draco mumbled something that Harry didn’t quite catch and shifted. “Draco why does your alarm go off to fucking early?” he moaned, grabbing a pillow and shoving it over his head to muffle the noise. “Cause else I’d be late.” he yawned, turning over to face Harry, he opened his eyes and laughed, pulling the pillow off Harry’s head. “What are you doing idiot?” smiling, Harry lifted his head up and Draco pushed the pillow back under his head.

“Trying to suffocate myself, Draco nobody gets up at 6am.” he whined. Rolling his eyes, Draco shifted closer and wrapped his arm around Harry’s waist, shuffling closer so he could snuggle in. “I set it because I like to sleep in, this way it feels like I’ve done it and I still have time to get ready.” he mumbled into Harry’s bare chest. Harry just laughed. “That’s a solid idea actually.”

“Of course it is, Potter,” he sighed. “It’s my idea.”

Harry rolled his eyes. “Prat.”

\-------------------------

When they entered the Ministry, both seemed in good spirits. Though, neither one of them dared to talk about what happened this morning. Whenever they’d catch each other’s gaze they’d simply just smile, like they had a secret that nobody else knew.

“Sir, I have a memo here from Kingsley.” Endelton smiled, handing the piece of parchment over to Harry, who smiled in return. He began to scan the file in front of him, a frown appearing. After, he looked to Draco and nodded towards their office, thanking Endelton.

Harry closed the door behind Draco and immediately passed him the parchment. It was a standard report, however it was filled out by Auror Lockwood. Yesterday. “Hm.” Draco hummed, he made his way over to his desk and sat down placing the parchment in front of him. Fishing through the files in the filing cabinet to his left, Draco finally found the piece of parchment he was looking for and set it down beside the new one.

“This wasn’t filled out by Lockwood.” he frowned, scanning each piece. “This here,” he tapped the file he’d taken out of the cabinet with his index finger and looked up at Harry, who was watching him closely. “Is a report I watched Auror Lockwood fill out, I know because I was teaching him the correct way to fill out a report.” he snorted at the memory, Lockwood had been absolutely atrocious at filling out correct field paperwork, he’d often miss sections or just write complete garbage, it irked Draco so much he stood for two hours discussing the proper way to fill out reports and basically micromanaged him. He never did it again after that.

“Alright, so if that’s not Lockwood’s handwriting then who’s is it?” Harry asked, walking over to the cork board. He noted that there was a piece of parchment he’d not seen before pinned to the left hand side of the cork board, beside the picture of the crop circle. Harry frowned. “This wasn’t here before.” he mumbled, his eyes scanning the new information.

Draco stood up and wandered over to him, looking at the offending article. He laughed. “That’s Granger's handwriting, I’d recognise it anywhere.” Harry nodded. “How is it you’re so good at that?” asked Harry, he tapped a finger against the side of his head, thinking for a moment before he turned his head to the other man. “There’s been a string of crop circles around England, mostly beside forests.” Harry said lamely.

Draco nodded, he was so engrossed in reading he’d completely missed Harry’s question regarding handwriting, after he’d finished he jogged over to the filing cabinet beside the door and yanked it open, sifting through it in a very un-Draco-like way. “What’s up?” Harry asked, his eyes rested on the sticky note memo, he wondered if Draco could tell who wrote this particular piece of evidence.

“Aha!” Draco exclaimed, pulling out a heavy file. He dumped it on his desk and began leaving through the contents. Harry turned his head on its side and frowned. “What?” he asked again, this time he walked up behind Draco and peered over his shoulder. It was a little difficult as the other man was a little taller than him, but not so hard since he was hunching over a little.

“Auror Lockwood said something to me the last time I spoke to him, he said ‘I wonder how the guys are doing with those crop circles’ and I just shrugged. I didn’t like him very much, he was a bit of a pompous prick,” Draco’s sentence was a said just a little faster than his usual tone, he was surely excited about this find. “I never thought about it at the time, but he inadvertently slipped up, or maybe he meant to do it but I just didn’t think about it.”

“That’s hilarious, you, Draco Malfoy didn’t like another person because they were a pompous prick.” Harry chuckled, shaking his head in disbelief.

“Wow, Harry, just wow,” rolling his eyes, he shifted away from Harry and walked around to the other side of his desk, sitting down with a scowl. “That’s what you got from that?” 

“Sorry,” Harry said lamely, ducking his head down a few inches. “So what you’re saying is, Lockwood was with the Celtic Serpents at least three months ago?” Draco just shrugged “I’m not sure - who was Lockwood’s partner when he was training?” Draco asked, looking at Harry expectantly. “Uh, er…” Harry frowned, racking his brains. He knew Lockwood’s partner hadn’t managed to complete their training but he would be damned if he knew who it was. If he could remember correctly, they were exceptionally lacklustre.

“I’m not sure, I remember they failed.” he sighed, running a hand through his hair. Draco just nodded. “I’ll ask Endelton, he was assigned Lockwood when he finished training.” 

After about half an hour, Draco had gone through his filing cabinets and retrieved almost every report Lockwood had ever filled out, some of them were joint with Endelton. Harry was stood clipping different pieces to the cork board he deemed necessary to the case. He’d rooted out the other cases of crop circles and put them beside the original, when he was done he frowned. They all seemed to be around the North Yorkshire area, he was sure they could rule that this particular area seemed to be where they preferred to base.

The only thing that didn’t add up is the murder. It was nowhere near North Yorkshire, they’d found the warehouse on the outskirts of Darlington, the second crop circle that had appeared was in a field not four miles away from the original. It was almost like this group were taunting them. He wondered what they wanted, what their end goal was. It seemed like a potions smuggling operation but he was sure there was more to it than that.

“How far have you gotten?” he asked, turning to face Draco who looked about neck deep in parchment at this point. “Well we can rule out that the sticky note and the report filed yesterday were not done by Lockwood, so either he changed his writing habits, masked it or we have someone else working for the Celtic Serpent within the department.” he sighed. Draco looked frazzled, it was only early in the day too. Harry sighed. “Do you want some coffee?” he asked, a pained smile on his face. Draco nodded, returning the smile. “Please.”

Once Harry had left the office, Draco let out a shaky breath. He was determined to work on this case as hard as he could but his mind couldn’t help but drift off to what happened last night and this morning, he knew it was stupid - he knew it was nothing, but it kept plaguing him. Having Harry in such close proximity made his concentration basically zero. 

Looking up, a paper air-plane memo began flying through the office and landed in the centre of Draco’s desk. Carefully, he unfolded it and read the words. “Meet me, water cooler, twenty minutes. H.G.” standing up, he straightened up his robes and walked over to the cork board, inspecting Harry’s handiwork. 

Harry had used colourful yarn to connect different pieces on the cork board, he smiled at the memory of them watching Law and Order together. He’d probably gotten the idea from there, Draco had mentioned whilst they were watching it they should use that on their cases and the next day the cork board sat proudly at the side of their spacious office. 

“Hey, here’s your coffee.” Harry said as he walked through the door, he kicked it shut with his heel and walked to Draco, handing it to him. Draco took the coffee and nodded, uttering a quick thank you before he started sipping it. “You know, we only have one murder but we have many crop circles, perhaps that woman was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time?” he suggested. “Do we know where she’d been prior to the murder?” 

Harry frowned and shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know offhand but I could check.” He rounded the desk and opened up a green filing cabinet at the back of his side of the office, this particular filing cabinet was only for death related cases. Once he found the file he handed it to Draco, who began to read it.

“Lockwood filled this report out.” Draco noticed, although the signature at the bottom was Lockwood’s he could tell some of this report was written by Endelton. “If he was working for Celtic Serpent then, he could have left some of the information we need now, out of it.” 

Harry nodded and sighed. “I think we need to talk to Kingsley about this.” Draco could only agree. “I’ll be back soon.” he mumbled, before exiting the office leaving Harry to his thoughts.

The case was getting more and more complicated by the second. There was a lot more to it than he’d originally anticipated and if they did have a mole in the department he needed to tell Kinglsey as soon as possible. Sighing, he left the office and made his way towards Kingsley’s. This was not going to be an easy meeting.

Once he’d arrived outside Kingsley’s office, he looked to the left and noticed Lavender talking to Henderson, he hadn’t realised they were friends. “Jean, do you fancy going for a drink after?” Lavender asked casually, leaning against the wall. Her hair was covering the side of her face that was scarred, though it didn’t seem to be off putting to Henderson, who smiled. “Yeah, I’d love to.”

Harry turned away, knocked on the door and entered as soon as he heard the Minister’s voice. Once inside, he closed the door behind him, cast a few silencing spells and sat down on the armchair opposite Shacklebolt’s desk. “Harry, what can I do for you.” the man smiled, looking up at him.

Harry began to explain the ins and outs of the case, how he’d been to the Department of Mysteries and shared information with them, it earned a frown from Kingsley but nevertheless he continued, he explained Hermione had pinned an important piece of parchment to his cork board, but of course hadn’t told anyone who it was from. He explained about the other crop circles, Lockwood’s memo and report and other relevant information. The look on Kingsley’s face was dark, the man was certainly angry at the prospect of a spy within the Ministry. After Harry stopped talking, he waited.

“I think that yourself, Auror Malfoy, Finnigan and Thomas should be the only Auror’s working this case.” Harry frowned. Endelton, Henderson and Brown were important parts of his team, but he couldn’t disagree that the spy may be within his department. Dean and Seamus were inherently trustworthy and would stick by his side no matter what. Kingsley had been skeptical when Harry first told him Draco would be his deputy, but the sheer volume and quality of his work spoke more than his past.

“Yes Sir.” he nodded. They talked for a few more minutes and agreed they’d officially close the case so Endelton, Henderson and Brown would be none the wiser - he was to assign odd tasks for them to do as and when they came in, but from now on he’d work undercover from the department to make sure whoever it was that was the mole now knew nothing of their investigation.

Once Harry had left the office, he let out a breath and made his way through the corridors, finally coming to the lunch room. He spotted the white-blonde hair of Draco and frowned. Draco stood by the water cooler in the break room with Hermione, they appeared deep in conversation. When Hermione’s eyes travelled and rested on Harry, she straightened up, nodded her head and exited the break room uttering a polite hello to him as she walked past. 

Harry entered the break room and frowned. Draco moved towards the refrigerator and opened it, peering inside. “What was that all about?” he asked curiously, watching Draco’s features for any tell tale signs. “Oh nothing, nothing important anyway.” Draco shrugged. He pulled out a sandwich and frowned, shrugging his shoulders. 

Harry gathered Seamus and Dean and they congregated in the break room, once they were both inside with Harry and Draco, he locked the door and cast a silencing spell around the room. Seamus looked at him with a frown. “What’s up mate?” he asked, sitting down on the sofa near the shuttered window.

After Harry retold everything that Kingsley had told him, as well as the fact they had a mole within the department, Seamus’ entire demeanour changed. He looked outraged, unfortunately in his group of friends loyalty was everything. After all, they’d never have gotten through the war without it. They held loyalty and bravery in high regard and rightly so. Dean didn’t utter so much as a word as Harry and Seamus discussed the mole, eventually he straightened up and looked over to Draco, who appeared lost in thought.

“Okay so where will we be meeting then? I have a feeling the others might get suspicious if we just walk in to your office at all hours of the day.” Dean sighed, turning to Seamus who shrugged his shoulders. “What about the safe house? You know the one we used when we were investigating those exploding cauldrons?” 

Draco shook his head, he was clearly listening. “No, Endelton used the same safe house to store that woman who had been attacked by the Werewolf.” Dean cringed, that particular case was the most gruesome one he’d witnessed, and he’d witnessed some pretty vile things in his years as an Auror. 

“What about our flat?” Harry suggested, turning his head to Draco. Draco’s eyes widened, they’d never used their flat for work before, it was a safe place for him. Harry took the hint and shook his head. “Hm. I’ll get back to you on that one.” he mumbled.

Once they’d all eaten and discussed everything, they left the break room in pairs. The day didn’t seem to be productive for Harry, but it felt more serious than it had before. 

“Another day in the life as Head Auror.” Draco smirked, nudging Harry with his elbow as they walked. “Yeah, ‘Spose.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This case is getting more and more complicated! Hooray for undercover ops. <3


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we are with another chapter :)

It had been four days since Kingsley had ordered Harry to go dark on the Celtic Serpent group. Everything seemed to be going well so far, Endelton, Brown and Henderson hadn’t suspected anything was amiss, but Harry was growing more and more frustrated as the days passed. They hadn’t gotten any new evidence, information and as they seemed to have gone dark, so had the Celtic Serpent group. The only thing keeping him sane was the fact that Draco had kept letting him sleep in his room. He’d asked again the second night and Draco had merely shrugged his shoulders. By now, he didn’t even bother asking he just joined him as soon as he said he was going to bed.

Harry wasn’t really sure what was going on between them, but they came home so exhausted at the end of the day they barely got around to eating nevermind talking. He was sat at his desk, twirling his self inking quill round his fingers. He’d assigned Endelton to clean up after a few wizards got in a heated debate which resulted in a duel, slap bang in the middle of Carlisle. Brown had gone with him, he suspected something was going on with Henderson and Brown, but he didn’t pry into his Auror’s personal lives.

Harry knew he was staring off into space again, but he couldn’t bring himself to do anything about it really. He was bored. Draco had been distracted ever since Harry had caught him in the break room with Hermione, he’d tried to ask again what they’d talked about but each time Draco brushed it off. He was starting to feel paranoid now.

“Everything okay?” Draco asked, a frown on his face. He’d been staring at Harry for the better part of fifteen minutes. He wasn’t usually able to stare at the other man interrupted but on this occasion he wondered if Harry would ever come out of his daydream. Biting his lower lip, his words did nothing for Harry’s current state. He repeated himself again, but still no joy.

Standing up, Draco brushed off his Auror robes and walked over to Harry’s desk, standing in front of it. He waved his hand in front of Harry’s face and smirked. Harry looked up at Draco with a blank expression on his face, suddenly his features changed and he offered Draco a warm smile. 

“Hey, what’s up?” he asked, clearing his throat after. “Wondered if everything was alright.” Draco sighed, running a hand through his hair. He turned to the corkboard, cringing as he heard Harry tut. He knew Harry was frustrated with their case, but nevertheless Harry stood up and walked over to the corkboard. “Well, I suppose I’ll take these down.” he mumbled, removing the yarn twisted around many pins. 

“Did you find anywhere suitable yet?” asked Draco, who’d now walked over to his desk. He’d left all the Celtic Serpent cases to the top left of his desk in a neat pile, ready for transporting to whatever facility Harry chose as their base. He received a grunt in response, but didn’t press.

The door to their office swung open and in entered Henderson, looking somewhat frazzled. “Sir,” she greeted, nodding her head towards Harry who’d turned to frown at the woman. He hadn’t expected that they’d get clean up done this quickly but after a glance at the clock he realised he’d been sitting there wallowing for close to four hours, no wonder Draco had been worried.

Jeanette Henderson was quite an excellent Auror, although she didn’t possess much muscle, she was a wicked shot in a duel, her duelling skills were unparalleled. She was about five foot seven, petite with long curly blonde hair usually tied up into a pony-tail. Obviously a quite attractive woman, Harry could appreciate, Jean was far too quiet for her own good. Perhaps that was why Harry was so shocked to see her converse with Lavender.

“Right, well we haven’t had any more cases come through our department, yourself and Brown are free to get lunch.” he offered her a weak smile, she nodded curtly at Harry, then Draco before exiting the office closing the door behind her.

“Have I really been sat there for four hours?” he moaned, turning his head to Draco who’s smirk had deepened, he’d not really seen that since school and it unsettled Harry somehow. “Well, I did talk to you a couple of times but all I got was a series of grunts, caveman like, you know?” A wicked grin spread across Draco’s features. 

“Ugh, I’m sorry. I wish we had more on this fucking case.” he cursed, shaking his head in dismay. He really thought they were getting somewhere with it, yesterday they’d gone back out to the crop circle area. They’d received Dean and Seamus’ report a couple of days ago in regards to the cabin. No spell traces were found and the cabin itself was clean, though they’d found traces that their wards had been tampered with.

Harry cursed himself that they’d left the area ‘secure’ so they could return later. All he’d done was made it easier for the Serpents to clean up whatever mess they’d left. He wasn’t even sure how they managed to get around their wards, they were foolproof nearly every single time. He had to say nearly now, they’d never been tampered with before. 

Harry felt uneasy lying to the other Auror’s about this cases existence, he knew Lavender was itching to do more than what they were doing - although Endelton was the most irritating man he’d ever met, the man got things that needed to be done, done. Henderson was quiet, but her duelling was vital to their operation and Lavender’s sheer strength was always comforting.

Although Dean and Seamus also possessed excellent qualities, when it came to high profile or dangerous cases, he was always happier to do it as a full team. Strength in numbers, Draco would say.

“Well in the meantime, we do have this case about missing pumpkins.” Draco laughed, waving a piece of parchment around. Harry scowled. “Pumpkins?” 

“Mm, Mrs. Dunn has lost three of her prized pumpkins, apparently it’s quite the scandal in the Wizarding vegetable competition community.” the sarcasm and amusement in Draco’s voice made Harry laugh. “Wizarding vegetable competition community.” Harry repeated, shaking his head. “Who in the bloody fuck made that ridiculously long name, and also, who the fuck decides that growing vegetables is a really great hobby?” 

Draco thought for a moment, before smiling. “I don’t know, farmers?”

Harry rolled his eyes.

\--------------------------------------

Harry had decided to clear his head, he’d take Draco with him to visit Mrs. Dunn about her prized pumpkins. He wasn’t sure if this was Kingsley’s idea of a joke passing this particular case on to his department, but he decided not to press. There were other Aurors that could deal with this sort of case, but then Harry mentally scolded himself for thinking so highly of himself.

They arrived outside a quaint cottage on the outskirts of Hogsmeade, quite close to where Hermione and Ron currently lived. You could tell immediately that Mrs. Dunn was quite the fan of growing vegetables, in fact he would go as much to say she was fanatical. Her entire garden was alive. The cottage itself quite small, it reminded him somewhat of Hagrid’s hut, just a little bigger.

“Right well, I suppose we better go take notes about these really important pumpkins.” Harry groaned, trudging up the gravelled path towards a heavy dark oak door. He knocked on the door, turning his head towards Draco who was inspecting a very large pumpkin beside him. “There’s a knocker, you know.” Draco pointed out as he turned his head to the door. Taking in a breath, Draco exhaled slowly. The door opened and there stood a very short elderly lady, her hair was white, a pair of half moon glasses sat on the tip of her nose. 

“Hello, I’m Auror Potter, this is my partner Auror Malfoy - we’re here about your missing pumpkins.” Harry recited, as politely as he possibly could. Draco smiled and nodded to the lady, who was eyeing Draco suspiciously. “Malfoy you say?” she looked thoughtful for a moment, then nodded her head. “Come in, would you like tea?” she offered, gesturing towards the worn green couch that stood proudly in front of her fireplace. 

Both Draco and Harry followed her inside, Harry sat down first - Draco stood to the side of him pulling out a small notepad from his robe pocket. Harry could tell that Draco looked somewhat uncomfortable. He was fiddling with his self-inking quill nervously. It always happens whenever someone commented on his surname. “You alright?” Harry whispered, looking up at Draco with a smile. He nodded in response and shrugged his shoulders.

Mrs. Dunn walked back through with a tray of cups, a pot of tea and a little bowl of sugar. She put it down on the small coffee table in front of them and smiled at Harry. “Could you tell me when you first noticed your pumpkins missing, Mrs Dunn?” Draco asked politely, giving her one of his classic fake smiles. Harry bit his lower lip. 

“It’s Olive, dear, and yes - I found them missing this morning, what it was, was I went outside to do my usual plant watering.. Yes.” she nodded her head, beginning to pour tea in two the three cups on the tray. “And I said, well I said oh where have you gone?” Harry bit his lip harder to stifle a laugh. Draco ducked his head down, scribbling furiously at the notepad in his hands. “I thought oh well, I knew you were there last night, where could you have gone.” 

She added milk to the three cups, then frowned. “Oh dear, did you want milk? I forgot to ask.” Harry nodded his head and smiled “Yeah, milk is fine, Draco likes milk too.” Olive smiled in return, handing a cup to Harry. “Thanks.” 

“Where was I?” she asked, picking up another cup she passed it to Draco who took it appreciatively and began to sip, he pursed his lips and placed it back down on the tray. “Thank you, it’s lovely.” 

Olive grinned and nodded. “Yes yes, my pumpkins - oh, my grandchildren I mean, they like my tea too.” She stood up and wandered back off to the kitchen, returning a few seconds later with a tray of biscuits. 

“Right well, where was I?” she asked again, sitting down beside Harry again. Harry cleared his throat “The pumpkins.” Olive smiled again, she seemed like such a happy lady, it warmed Harry’s heart - somehow she reminded him of Molly a little. “That bloody Jim, he lives not far from here he’s been after my pumpkins for months!” she exclaimed, eyes wide. “I bet it was him!” 

Draco finished writing in the notepad and picked his tea up again, listening intently as Harry had a light conversation with Olive about her pumpkins - then her grandchildren, what turned in to a light conversation turned into a full blown discussion about cooking. Harry enthusiastically discussed Draco’s cooking, praising how much he enjoyed it when he did cook, then explained they were much too busy for that these days. Olive had put a hand on his thigh and smiled. “Well, if two lovely young men like you can work together too, you’ll be married for years! Just like me and my Henry.” Harry blushed profusely and shook his head, but Draco couldn’t help but notice he hadn’t put her right about their relationship. 

Harry slapped his hands onto his thighs and stood up, nodding his head towards Draco. “Well we best be off, we’ll be in touch about your pumpkins Mrs. Dunn.” she handed both of them a few biscuits for the road and they left the cottage about 45 minutes after they’d entered.

“Well, Auror Potter, we better get back to the office and type up this report about the pumpkins.” Harry teased, grinning at Draco, who looked utterly confused, all of a sudden it clicked and he blushed, his eyes widening a little. “Shut up, you idiot.” his features changing to a scowl, shaking his head. He took off a little ahead of Harry and stood at the gate, his arms folded.

“Just so you know, it would be Malfoy-Potter.” he stated, before disapparating. A surprised look flitted across Harry’s features, before settling on a wicked smirk. “Malfoy-Potter huh?” he said to thin air, as he apparated to the Ministry. Once he’d gotten back to his department, he frowned. It was far too quiet, usually the ruckus was in full swing by this time, he looked around and spotted Endelton sitting at his desk quietly, Harry wandered over to him and perched himself on the edge of his desk. “Where is everyone?” His eyes travelled down to the parchment Endelton was filling out and bit his lip.

“I have no idea, Dean and Seamus ran off about twenty minutes said it was important, Brown and Henderson got called into the Minister’s office and I think I just saw Draco go in to your office.” he said slowly, looking up at Harry with a frown. “Why?”

Harry shrugged, his thoughts immediately went to Seamus and Dean - what happened to make them run off like that? Was it Celtic Serpent related? “No reason.” he replied, before jogging back to his office. He shut the door behind him and looked over at Draco, who was sat on top of the filing cabinet beside his desk, swinging his legs.

“Do you know why Seamus and Dean ran off earlier?” he asked Draco, slightly confused as to what the other man was doing. Draco shook his head and frowned, slipping down from atop the cabinet. “No, let me check the reports.” he said, knitting his eyebrows together. 

Scouring the reports he had laid out on his desk, Draco picked up one that was set aside and frowned, scanning the words. It seemed that someone had placed it there in a hurry but didn’t want it to be mixed up in the active reports. Draco murmured a quick spell to check there was nothing amiss, before turning his attention back to Harry. He had a slightly worried look on his face, that Harry instantly recognised. 

“I don’t know who left this here, but there’s been another murder.” Draco sighed. He picked up his wand from his desk and waited for Harry. Harry quickly ran to the other side of the office, grabbed his supplies and nodded towards his partner. “Lets go.” he said simply. Draco looked down at the parchment once again to get the coordinates and held his arm out for Harry to side-along. Harry gave Draco a reassuring smile, before they disappeared with a pop.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for all the support guys! special love for my best friend @EvaEleanor <3

When Harry and Draco arrived at the coordinates, neither man really knew what to expect. Upon apparition, Harry was immediately greeted by Seamus. The other man was always known for how upbeat he was, he was extremely well put together when it came to their work and he rarely ever showed signs of emotion, Harry always prided his teammate on his professionalism. However, he had never once witnessed how destroyed his friend looked, unshed tears prickling his eyes, he looked pale, a little green around the edges. Dean on the other hand stood by the curb being violently sick. Harry’s stomach plummeted as he turned his head towards his partner. Draco looked just as shaken by the two other Auror’s as Harry felt. 

Clearing his throat, Harry gestured towards Dean, who Harry assumed had absolutely nothing left in his stomach at this point. “What’s happened?” he asked Seamus, his voice faltering slightly. Draco placed a hand on his shoulder, it was his way of providing comfort.

Seamus let out a breath and shook his head. “Murdered, but they’ve…” he trailed off, swallowing a lump in his throat. “They’ve cut…” he stammered, shaking his head again. “Merlin, you just need to see it - it’s unexplainable.”

Harry nodded, gathered his bearings and looked towards his partner again, a silent agreement between the two of them. They walked through the large arched front door into the passageway. The smell hit him as soon as he entered, he gasped. “Fuck.” he cursed, moving slowly through the passageway. The floor was covered in blood, smears as though a body had been dragged along the carpet. As the two of them walked into a small living room, Harry’s jaw dropped. He felt the bubbling in his stomach intensify as his eyes locked to the horror in front of him.

“What the absolute fuck.” Draco said, shaking his head. Harry took a careful look at his partner, his face ashen. The room was destroyed, broken pieces of furniture scattered along the back wall, the sofa upturned in the small joined kitchen. The carpet which was once a light green colour was now stained dark with blood. The body, which Harry could only assume was female cut into pieces, the parts scattered in to the Celtic Serpent symbol. Harry immediately turned around and gagged.

“Get someone in here to.. Collect.. Fucking hell.” he shook his head, disbelief. He’d never witnessed something so gruesome in his life. Bile rose up his throat, he grabbed a hold of Draco’s hand and pulled him out into the street, gasping as the cool air hit him. Seamus looked surprised, but nodded in acknowledgement. Harry had seen some horrors in his life, but if this affected him so greatly, Seamus could only but sympathise.

Dean was now sitting on the edge of the curb, his head in his hands. The contents of his stomach cleaned up from the pavement, Seamus had a careful hand on his partner's shoulder, rubbing small soothing circles on his back. “I can’t believe what I just saw.” Harry admitted.

Draco had not uttered a single word, the sound he did hear was the other man hurling into a drain near another house. Immediately, Harry was at his side, he placed a hand on Draco’s back. Once he’d finished, he turned his head to Harry his cheeks pink with embarrassment. “Sorry.” he whispered, leaning his head into Harry’s shoulder. “I’ve sent word to the department, someone’s going to come out and… Collect it.” Seamus grimaced. Harry only nodded.

“You have nothing to be sorry for.” he whispered to Draco, who looked up at him. He could see the pain in his eyes, Harry could only imagine the horrors the blonde witnessed during the war, they’d talked about it of course, but he could only assume. “Mm.” Draco mumbled, shaking his head. “We have to catch these bastards, Harry.” his voice faltered, he looked destroyed, pain etched in to those sparkling gray eyes. A tear ran down his cheek, Harry’s heart broke for him.

He rubbed his thumb along Draco’s cheek, wiping away the tears that fell. “We will, Draco, I promise.” he whispered back. 

\------------------------------

Once the four of them had returned to the Ministry, Harry was immediately called in to a meeting with Kingsley. He was surprised to see Hermione and Unspeakable Wilson in attendance. Draco had been asked to attend also, Harry was sitting on the high back armchair, Draco perched on the arm of the chair. Ever since they’d witnessed the scene, Draco had never left his side. He’d even asked Harry if he needed the toilet, to which Harry immediately said yes - not because he actually needed the toilet but because Draco had never asked him this before, it was as if he already knew the blonde did not want to be alone. 

What Harry didn’t expect, is Blaise Zabini to saunter in the room like he owned the place. Harry quirked an eyebrow up. “What are you doing here?” asked Harry curiously. Blaise merely smirked. “Well, Potter..” he started, eyeing Hermione with caution. 

Kingsley cleared his throat and gestured for Blaise to sit down. “I have made the Department of Mysteries aware of our current case,” he started, shaking his head. “I must say, that is the most graphic and truly horrifying report I have ever read, Auror Malfoy.” he sighed.

“Unspeakable Zabini is one of our deep undercover Unspeakables, his cover being Gringotts.” he started, Harry’s eyes widened his head immediately snapping towards Draco, who looked equally shocked. “Unspeakable Zabini has a lot of connections, as well as a lot of skills that we do not like to announce to the public.” 

Harry nodded, he couldn’t disagree the work Unspeakables did was not only dangerous, but of course a secret. He’d been friends with Hermione most of his life and she was yet to tell him what she actually did within the department. Not even Ron knew.

“But this particular incident has had me take drastic measures. You are to keep this a secret, do not let your team members know.” Kingsley put sternly, giving Harry the look he only knew too well. “Aurors Thomas and Finnigan know we are investigating the Celtic Serpents, however they are not to know Zabini is an Unspeakable, furthermore I would like yourself and Auror Malfoy to liaise with the Department of Mysteries.”

Harry frowned. Hermione cleared her throat and turned her head towards Draco and Harry, a pained expression on her face. “We have been aware of the Celtic Serpents for about three months. Their official name is Serpents of Death, but they’ve caught wind of your codename and took it upon themselves to change it, they seemed to like what you dubbed them as.” 

Harry grimaced, he felt Draco’s fingers wrap around his forearm tightly. “They were shipping crates of maximum strength Veratiserum to use on the new recruits of their organization to ensure cooperation and ultimately, loyalty.” Harry nodded, gesturing for her to continue. “What we believe is they intend to use the Dark Arts to conjure some sort of…”

“Weapon.” Unspeakable Wilson cut her off, her face remained impassive, Harry always found this deeply unsettling. Wilson creeped him out most days. “They’re trying to recreate an Elder Wand.” Harry gasped, shaking his head. “Surely they can’t do that?”

“They’re trying to recreate the Deathly Hallows, but in mass. So they can equip all of their followers to be the ultimate masters of death.” Wilson continued, ignoring Harry’s question. Zabini let out a sigh. “You’d think it would be impossible, but they’ve created an exceptionally powerful weapon already, we seized an early copy of it from a wizard that under imperius entered the Ministry of Magic in an attempt to kill the Minister.”

Draco’s hold tightened to an almost unbearable pain, Harry grimaced and looked up at his partner. The other man looked almost ill. He slackened his grip and gave an apologetic half-smile to Harry, who nodded.

“Whether they can do it is questionable, but we do intend to stop it. We know they only have a group of eight, but if they manage to recreate then they will be an almost unstoppable force with only eight.” Unspeakable Wilson said, and for the first time a flicker of emotion passed her features. It caught Harry off guard, if even Wilson was worried this was serious.

“What can we do?” asked Harry, who was at a loss. 

The room was silent for a few moments, before Kingsley let out a sigh and shook his head. “Keep an eye out for things that are similar to their past actions, liaise with the Department of Mysteries, share information, go through old cases and Auror Lockwood’s files, triple check. All incoming cases scrutinise for anything relating to the Serpents.” he said, dejected. Harry knew this case was serious, he knew they were at a loss. It was terrifying.

\-----------------------------

Draco and Harry had entered their office together, as soon as the door was closed Draco let out a shaky breath and stood with his back up against the door. He was a little unsteady, Harry walked towards his desk and placed a piece of parchment he’d received off Unspeakable Wilson down on his Celtic Serpent pile. His thoughts flickered to Blaise, he’d known him for a long time now, they’d gone out to the pub together, had him over to his and Draco’s flat, he’d been at his wedding, how could he know so little about the man he thought was his friend?

He knew Unspeakable work was, well unspeakable, but he wondered if his wife knew. Ron didn’t know much about Hermione’s work, but he did know she was an Unspeakable. Harry supposed it was because Hermione was so known in the wizarding world, it would be almost impossible to be in Blaise’s position for Hermione. His thoughts travelled to how it would be for Blaise, hiding a part of himself from everyone that knew him. 

A pang of guilt hit him, here he was debating whether or not he could trust a friend he’d had for years now, and he didn’t think about how hard it must be to Blaise’s life. He shook his head in dismay, it truly was a complex situation.

He heard a thunk from behind him, he turned around his eyes resting on Draco who had slid down the door and brought his knees up to his chest, burying his head. Without thinking, Harry ran over and knelt beside Draco, placing a gentle hand on his back. “Are you alright?” he asked cautiously, he knew Draco didn’t like to feel vulnerable, but he hated even more when his vulnerability was shown around others. 

Looking up at Harry with teary eyes, Draco let out another shaky breath, tears began to pour down his pale cheeks, glistening in the harsh light of their office. Harry placed his free hand on Draco’s cheek. “You’re okay.” he whispered, nodding his head. He offered Draco a sad smile, he knew his partner was hurting.

Draco held his breath, staring up at Harry with such intensity. When Kingsley had explained the details Draco had clammed up immediately. His thoughts wild, intense and terrifying. There was nothing scarier than the threat of Voldemort, especially for himself and his parents. But now everything had changed, the only person in the world Draco wished to protect was the man in front of him. Nothing else mattered but Harry. He’d come to this startling realisation when they’d entered that house, he shivered at the thought.

The horror he'd witnessed in that house brought him back to the days of Voldemort in the Manor. It was about his standards anyway. His thoughts wandered to some of the bodies he’d seen in the dungeons of the Manor, some of the horrors he’d witnessed at the hands of Voldemort, or even his own father. 

Draco smiled sadly at Harry, he wrapped his fingers around Harry’s hand, which was still resting on his cheek and closed his eyes, leaning in to that touch. Draco was terrified, he knew he was a good Auror, he’d worked incredibly hard to get where he was. He’d done it all with Harry, who made him strong, brave and better. Draco often regretted the decision to avoid a Mind Healer, he’d announced to everyone he planned to do it himself. Neither him nor Harry had attended.

They wanted to fix each other.

Harry pressed his forehead against Draco’s and let out a shaky breath. “Draco,” he whispered softly, he hesitated for a few moments, thoughts wild. “Draco…” he repeated, unsure. “Yes?” replied Draco, in the same hushed tone. 

“I-I” Harry started, he had a million and one things to tell the other man, his thoughts were whirling around his head like a hurricane, his heart hammering in his chest. He wanted to tell Draco he loved him, he wanted to tell him everything he loved about him, how he wasn’t sure how he’d live life without him, but the words were caught in his throat.

A gentle tapping on his office door pulled him out of his thoughts, he snapped back abruptly, staring at the door. The tapping was a departmental memo, he looked down at Draco who seemed to be mentally putting himself together. He cursed his luck, shaking his head. This was a conversation for another day.

Draco stood up and brushed down his robes, avoiding Harry’s gaze. He opened the door and let the memo fly through the office door, landing gently on Draco’s desk. He quietly walked over to the desk and picked the memo up. A laugh escaped his lips as he turned to Harry, holding up the offending memo in his hands.

“They found the pumpkin thief.” he said shaking his head in disbelief. Harry raised an eyebrow and smiled. “Who was it?” 

“Tommy Jenkins.” Draco frowned, staring at the memo. “Guess we better break it to poor Mrs. Dunn that it wasn’t that bloody Jim.” he teased, grinning at Harry. The look on Draco’s face made Harry’s stomach jump, he returned the grin, nodding his head. “Yeah.”

\---------------------------

When they’d arrived outside Mrs. Dunn’s cottage, Harry looked down at his watch and tapped it lightly with his finger. “Home after this.” he grinned, giving Draco a wink. Draco ducked his head down, a blush tinging his cheeks.

“If you keep winking at me like that Mrs. Dunn is going to definitely think we’re shagging.” Draco teased, looking at Harry with a playful look on his face. Harry nudged him with his right elbow as he knocked on the door with his left hand. 

“Chance would be a fine thing.” Harry muttered, not realising how it sounded.

Draco narrowed his eyes, as the door opened Mrs. Dunn stood with a cat in her arms. A big ginger cat that reminded Harry somewhat of Crookshanks. “Hello boys!” she exclaimed. She looked at them with a suspicious look, eyebrow quirked.

“Did you catch my pumpkin thief? Was it Jim? I told you!” she pointed at them, shaking her finger. Harry bit his lip, trying to hold back a laugh. Draco cleared his throat and nodded his head. “We caught the pumpkin thief, it was apparently Tommy Jenkins, is that name familiar to you?” Harry noticed Draco had tried to sound as professional as possible but really, it was a case about a missing batch of pumpkins.

Mrs. Dunn let out a gasp and then growled. “Bloody Tommy, that’s Jim’s brother! I bet he stole them for him.” she let the cat down from her arms and placed her hands on her hips in defiance. “If I find those bloody pumpkins anywhere near our competition I will be setting them on bloody well fire!”

Harry brought his fist up to his mouth, trying to conceal a laugh. Draco rolled his eyes and nodded, offering a sympathetic smile to Mrs Dunn. “We have confiscated the stolen items, once they’ve been checked over by the department we’ll be returning them to you.” 

Mrs Dunn seemed to perk up at the prospect of her pumpkins being returned, a warm smile appearing on her face. “Well come on then you two, inside, a cup of tea! My heroes, such a lovely pair.” 

Draco rolled his eyes as she turned her back and sent a wicked smirk Harry’s way. “Touch the chocolate digestives and I’ll break your fingers, Potter.” he sauntered in the house ahead of him, leaving Harry at the doorstep. “Oh no you don’t Malfoy!” he shouted as he ran in after him.

\----------------

When they finally arrived home, Harry had begun to strip his robes off in the living room, he tossed them carelessly onto the floor beside the coffee table, pulled his t-shirt over his head and started unbuckling his belt when he heard the protest from Draco, who’d entered a little slower behind him.

“What the bloody hell are you doing?!” Draco asked, trying to cover his eyes with his hand in melodramatic fashion. Harry let out a laugh. “You’ve seen me naked in the shower, and you’re upset about me taking my clothes off here?”

Draco’s cheeks pinked as he recalled the day he walked into the bathroom whilst Harry was showering. He’d needed the toilet badly, after running down the street for two of Harry’s favourite Scotch Pies from the corner shop, he’d entered the flat so quickly, thrown the pies on the counter and ran straight to the toilet.

He cursed the amount of hot chocolates he’d had that day, but it was absolutely freezing. They were merely to warm him up. Nothing to do with the fact they were chocolate, sweet and delicious. Nope, not at all. He’d burst into the bathroom and closed the door behind him, walked to the toilet and frowned at the amount of steam, before he turned his head and realised to his horror he’d walked in while Harry was in the shower.

The other man, all muscles and taut skin had sent his brain into a frenzy. That and the fact Potter was half hard. Draco groaned inwardly. He’d remembered running out of the bathroom so quickly he slid on the tiles and ended up on his arse. Harry doubled over with laughter.

“Yes well, semantics.” Draco declared, shaking his hand in a circular motion. “Put your bloody clothes back on you heathen.” he shook his head, trying to sound as put out as he possibly could. Harry just laughed and unbuckled his belt, tossing it onto the sofa.

He was just about to unbutton his trousers when he felt Draco’s hands on his biceps. “If you pull those trousers down, Potter,” Draco started, the look in his eyes something Harry didn’t recognise.

“I’ll bite your dick off.” he finished. Harry let out a bark of laughter. “You’ll bite my-” he was cut off by a hand slapping to his mouth. He looked at Malfoy with challenging eyes, and licked his hand. Draco recoiled and stuck his tongue out in disgust.

“Fucking hell you’re a dirty bastard!” he shouted, wiping his hand on his robes. “Dirty, dirty bastard. Who the fuck licks someone?” 

Harry shrugged his shoulders, then pulled his trousers down when the last button was undone. “Someone who doesn’t want to be muted, here you go, come bite my dick off then, I dare you.” he winked. Draco looked at him for a few moments, jaw gone slack and made a beeline for Harry, who started to move too. “No! No!” he exclaimed between laughter, he began running around the sofa, past the coffee table and towards the front door in just his boxers, Draco hot on his tail.

“Come back you!” Draco shouted, his boots clunking against the floor as he ran. “No! I didn’t mean it Draco no!” Harry stood up against the front door, his hands up in the air in surrender.  
“Mm, I think you’ve earned yourself detention, Potter.” Draco stated, shaking his head. “Fifty points from Gryffindor and you have to order takeaway for the next fifty years too.”

“Yes Sir.” Harry winked.

Draco rolled his eyes, his eyes travelling down Harry’s body. He swallowed, then his eyes rested on the only article of clothing left on his fine physique. “Oi!” Draco shouted, it sounded unlike him and horribly common coming out of his posh mouth. Harry frowned. “What?”

“Those are my fucking boxers Potter!”


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we are again!

It was their first day off work and Merlin knows Harry needed it. He lay sprawled out on the sofa in their living room flicking through the various different channels on the television. A forgotten cup of tea lay on the coffee table in front of him, his right arm hanging off the edge. He’d settled on a program about superheroes, Harry often wondered why muggles made such programs - some of the powers were so close to spells he knew, he wondered if it was breaking the Statute of Secrecy, but then again if the directors were actual muggles it wouldn’t make a difference.

The front door swung open and in walked Draco, a bag of groceries hanging off his arm. He was casually eating an apple as he kicked the door shut with his foot. “Well, aren’t you being a lazy shit?” he smirked, shaking his head at his friend. Harry snorted. “I’m allowed to be lazy, we haven’t had a day off in like forever.” he groaned, shifting on the sofa a little. He had a cramp in his leg but _refused_ to budge. 

“What did you buy?” asked Harry, turning his head in Draco’s direction with a raised eyebrow. Draco merely shrugged his shoulder and dumped the bag down on the countertop. Tossing the applecore in to the bin, he quickly washed his hands and opened his grocery bag. “I got marshmallows, haribo, jelly beans, dolly mixtures, hmm,” he trailed off, picking up a packet of sweets from the bag. “Pear drops, they sound interesting.” he nodded in approval. Harry sat up and let out a laugh. “Are you serious? You went to Tesco to buy random junk?”

Draco scowled at him. “I didn’t _just_ buy junk, I bought everything we need for spaghetti bolognese, I also bought new shampoo and a rubber duck, because I heard Arthur bring them up for about the hundredth time.” Harry burst into laughter, wiping a stray tear away from his eye. “He’s been talking about rubber ducks since I was about twelve.” admitted Harry, slumping back onto the sofa. 

“Spag bol sounds nice though.” he added, turning his attention back to the television. Draco tsked and began to pack the food away in to the fridge and cupboard above the microwave, which Harry aptly named Draco’s shit cupboard. It was honestly just full of absolute junk.

“Potter,” Draco started, staring at the television from across the room. “What the fuck are you watching?” he asked. Harry shrugged his shoulders and held the remote up in the air. “Some shit, what do you want to watch?”

Draco walked towards the sofa and shifted Harry’s legs to sit down, once he was sat down Harry placed his legs on top of Draco’s thighs and threw the remote to him. “So on our only day off for the foreseeable, we’re going to watch shit television and sit around?” Draco asked, turning his head towards Harry, who looked effortlessly ruffled. Clearly, the man hadn’t bothered to change out of his pyjamas, nor did he brush his hair today. “Yeah, pretty much.” mumbled Harry, his eyes still fixed to the box.

“Alright then, well I’m going out.” Draco announced, turning his attention to the television. Harry frowned. “Okay where are we going?” he bit his lip. Harry really didn’t have any intention of going out today, but if Draco wanted to he would make the effort. Draco let out a chuckle and rolled his eyes. “I said _I’m_ going out, I have a date.” he smiled. Harry’s head immediately snapped towards Draco’s direction, his eyes wide. An unsettling feeling in the pit of his stomach, like waving nausea. “You have a date?” he repeated flatly. Draco nodded his head. “Yes, I have a date.” he tapped Harry’s legs for him to lift up, once Harry had moved his legs he pulled himself up off the sofa and made his way back to the kitchen.

“Right..” Harry mumbled, looking back towards the television. Suddenly, he didn’t really feel like watching anything so he turned the television off and stood up, straightening himself out. He looked down at his pyjamas and bit his lip. Maybe if he made a little more effort, he thought.

“It’s going to be so exciting.” Draco announced sarcastically. “The most fun I’ve had in _years_ ” he drawled. Harry frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Apparently Gringotts have found a vault belonging to my father, so I have an appointment to go see what the fuck it is.” Draco grumbled, pulling out a pan from the bottom cupboard. Harry immediately felt a wave of relief wash over him. His frown deepened, he knew Draco despised anything to do with his father, but he idly wondered why the appointment was scheduled for later on. “I’ll come with you.” Harry announced, nodding his head.

Draco gave him a sidelong glance and shrugged his shoulders. “If you insist.” Harry bit his lip and walked towards the kitchen, pulling out the spaghetti from the cupboard. He placed it down on the side and grabbed a pan for it. He filled the pan up under the sink and placed it down on the hob, turning the dial.

“You’re helping.” Draco pointed out, looking a little confused. Harry smiled at him. “Yeah, why not?”

“You don’t usually help.” he mumbled under his breath, pulling out the minced beef from the fridge. He cut open the packet and dumped it into the frying pan, placing it down on the front ring of the hob. Harry shrugged his shoulders.

\----------------------------

Once dinner was prepared, Harry began to set the small circular table near the window. Draco had frowned deeply and watched him for a few moments. The question was on the tip of his tongue, there was definitely something wrong with Harry. Draco had made such an effort to learn how to cook and he was very proud of himself, but Harry _never_ helped. It just wasn’t done. He’d stand and talk to Draco incessantly about some garbage whilst he did so, though.

“Harry,” he started, making his way towards the table with two loaded plates of Spaghetti Bolognese, he placed one plate on each of the black placemats, then walked back to the kitchen to retrieve the platter of garlic bread. He levitated the two full glasses of cola he’d filled and they gently dropped onto the table. Placing the platter down in the middle of the table, Draco sat down on the seat opposite Harry and bit his lip.

“Harry what’s wrong?” he asked finally, letting out a sigh. Harry looked up at him, frowning. “What do you mean?” he asked, picking his fork up. He twirled spaghetti around his fork and raised it to his mouth, staring at Draco expectantly.

Shaking his head, Draco picked his own fork up and held it in his hand for a few moments. “You don’t help cook, nor do you set the table. We rarely bloody sit here, what’s wrong?” Harry shrugged his shoulders and shovelled a forkful of spaghetti in to his mouth.

“Nothing.” he said between food, earning a grimace from Draco, who promptly scolded him for his terrible table manners. Something he did frequently. Draco hummed and began eating. 

Harry launched himself in to a full blown conversation about the Celtic Serpents with Draco, talking about what they’d learnt the previous day. The dinner settled in to a comfortable chatter, Harry picked up way too many pieces of garlic bread, dipping it into the sauce generously. Even though he had terrible table manners, Draco couldn’t help but feel satisfaction when Harry enjoyed his food. He was never allowed to cook in the Manor, he was never taught. He found it therapeutic to learn, then he realised he thoroughly enjoyed it. It was a little like potions, you could alter it slightly to make it better, but if you did too much it would end up bad. He’d even started creating his own recipes. 

Once they’d finished dinner, Draco turned his head towards the fridge. “Do you want dessert?” he asked, looking at Harry who was sat slouched back in his chair. “Mm, yeah.” he nodded. Draco snorted and shook his head, he stood up and took their plates over to the kitchen counter. Quickly muttering a spell so the pots, pans and dishes would wash themselves. He wandered over to the fridge and pulled out a blackforest gateau, which he’d purchased in Tesco earlier. He had thought about making his own dessert, but he wasn’t sure he’d have the time.

Placing the cake down on the side, he carefully cut two slices and plated them up on small side plates, sticking a fork in the top of each one. He walked back over to the table and placed it in front of Harry, who eyed the cake. “Mm, I love this one.” Harry commented, leaning forward in his chair. He grabbed the fork and started stabbing the cake, shovelling it into his mouth with impressive speed. Draco shook his head.

“It’s a nice one, I’ll admit.” he nodded in agreement. His thoughts, however were drifting back to Harry’s irregular behaviour. He looked like a smacked crup when he announced he had a date, it was a joke, of course, could Harry like him too?

\------------------

After they’d finished their cake, cleared up the place Harry had disappeared into the bathroom the soft sound of water trickling. Draco smiled. He entered his bedroom and quickly got changed to a smart black three piece dress robe. He was fixing his cufflinks when Harry entered his room, towel slung around his waist.

Draco frowned, his eyes wandering as Harry walked towards the wardrobe. “What are you doing?” he asked curiously, eyebrow raised. Harry looked at him as though he had two heads. “Getting dressed, why?” he asked, opening the wardrobe door. Although they spent every single night sleeping in the same bed, Draco must’ve missed the memo when Harry moved all of his clothes into his room. The thought caused his cheeks to stain with the pinkest blush.

“Cufflinks.” he said lamely, turning away from the other man. Harry nodded and pulled out his own suit, letting out a sigh. “I hate wearing dress robes.” he declared, throwing it on the bottom of the bed. Draco eyed it, noting that it was pretty much identical to his own. It only caused his blush to deepen. They matched.

Harry wandered over to the drawers nearest the door and opened the top one, pulling out a pair of boxers. Draco turned fully towards him, hand on his hip - he tried his best to compose himself. “When did you move into my room?” he asked boldly.

Harry turned around and laughed. “When I spent every night in here instead of my own room.” he said, walking back over towards the bed. Draco cringed, his eyes resting on the still open drawer. He wandered over and closed the drawer, but didn’t reply. He left the room so Harry could get changed and sat on the arm of the sofa, waiting.

Once Harry had fully dressed, he entered the living room and gave Draco a sheepish smile. “We match.” he said, mimicking Draco’s earlier thoughts.

“Yes.” agreed Draco. He stood up, straightening out his robes. “Why are we wearing suits, we’re only going to Gringotts.” Harry sighed, running a hand through his messy damp hair. Draco shrugged his shoulders. “I always do, we could always go somewhere after to put them to good use.” he winked.

Harry beamed.

\-------------------

They arrived outside Gringotts and Harry had to mentally prepare himself. After what happened during the war the Goblins absolutely loathed him, he always felt deeply uncomfortable when he entered the bank. He cast a sidelong glance to Draco, who smiled at him apologetically, before they entered together.

Immediately, eyes rested upon Harry. Some were that of disdain, others wary. He let out a huff and linked his arm with Draco’s. Looking down at their linked arms, Draco bit his lip and walked up to the Head Goblin. “I have an appointment.” he declared smoothly, the Head Goblin looked him over and nodded his head, gesturing off to the right.

Draco copied his nod, walking off to the right where he sat down on one of the wooden benches along the back wall. Harry sat down beside him and put a comforting hand on Draco’s knee. “Do you know what’s in the vault?” he whispered. Draco shook his head. “No, but knowing my father it will be a load of expensive junk.” he spat, bitterly.

They waited a further five minutes before a Goblin came out of a side door, beckoning the two of them to enter the room. Once inside, Draco took a seat in a plush armchair turning his attention to the Goblin who sat behind the desk.

“Mr. Malfoy,” the Goblin started, eyeing Harry curiously. “As you are aware, we have found a vault belonging to the late Mr. Malfoy.” Draco nodded, gesturing for him to continue. “Naturally, we had to have it scanned first, however it has come up clean therefore we can hand over the key to yourself.”

Harry’s hand rested on his knee once again, without thinking Draco wrapped his fingers around his hand, squeezing gently. The Goblin continued on telling him about the vault, Draco had asked what the contents of the vault were, however the Goblin merely said he needed to have a look for himself. Draco let out a sigh of discomfort. He wanted nothing to do with his father. He only wished to close the damn thing.

Soon, they were in a cart going to the vault in question. Draco couldn’t seem to get rid of the waving nausea in his stomach, when he found out his father had died he really couldn’t seem to muster enough sympathy to care. All of his life he strove for approval. To his dying day, his father had never given him that. Though, by then he did not want it.

Once they arrived outside the vault, Harry took Draco’s hand intertwining their fingers. Draco looked at him, his eyebrows knitted together. They did not do this usually, he had the anxiety of what lay behind the large door in front of him, and what the hell was going on between himself and Harry all at once. 

“You’ll be fine.” Harry whispered, his comforting words eased the nausea a little, but he couldn’t help but feel on edge. The Goblin took the key, and after a few moments the vault opened. Draco swallowed.

Harry and Draco stepped inside the vault together, their eyes wandering around the contents. Draco had never seen this vault before in his life. There were hundreds of paintings, scattered around the back wall, units as high as the ceiling ram packed with different artifacts. He stepped towards the first unit, frowning.

“I haven’t seen any of this stuff before.” Draco admitted, gripping Harry’s hand a little tighter. Harry nodded. “It all looks very… Expensive?” he shrugged. Draco nodded too, biting his lip. They spent about thirty minutes scanning all the various objects around the room. It seemed to be family heirlooms mainly, he wondered why his mother had never mentioned it.

“Draco.” Harry breathed, waving his hand for him to come over. Draco walked towards him, looking at him expectantly. “What?” he looked in the direction Harry was fixed to, his eyes widening. “What…” he breathed, he held his hand out to pick up the object but thought better of it.

“Is that..?” he trailed off, eyes wandering towards Harry’s face. Harry nodded, giving him a grim smile. In front of them, stood a trinket box with the mark of the Celtic Serpents.

“What the fuck else was your father involved in?” Harry spat venomously. Draco let out a groan. “Fuck knows, but we’ll have to take this to Kingsley.” Harry nodded and looked at him sympathetically. “I guess there goes our evening plans.” 

“Another day in the life as a fucking Auror.” Draco whined, his head dropping down on to Harry’s shoulder. Harry pressed a kiss to his forehead, stunning Draco. They stood like that for about five minutes, Draco’s thoughts going wild.

He definitely likes me, he mused.

\--------------------------

When they left Gringotts, trinket box safely shielded and removed from the vault, they apparated to the Ministry and immediately made their way to Kingsley’s office. It was about 6pm now, so Harry knew most of the Auror’s would’ve gone home. Once stood outside the office, Harry gently knocked on the door. Hearing the boom of Kingsley’s voice, they entered together and shut the door behind them.

Draco began to explain about the Goblin’s finding a vault belonging to his father, Harry produced the trinket box in question and placed it down gently on to Kingsley’s desk, the shimmer of magic surrounding it. A few minutes later, Unspeakable Wilson, Hermione and Blaise entered the office.  
Blaise eyed the trinket box warily, sending a confused look to his friend. Once they’d explained once again where they’d found it, Unspeakable Wilson cleared her throat.

“I would like to take the artifact in question so that myself and Unspeakable Granger can inspect it.” she said evenly, eyeing Kingsley. “That will be fine.” he nodded in agreement. Hermione bit her lip and turned her head towards Draco. “If it’s okay, we’d like to seize the vault so we can look through it a little better.” 

Draco reached into his pocket and produced the key to the vault, which he’d received back off the Goblin before himself and Harry had exited Gringotts. He handed it over to Hermione without a second thought. Hermione smiled. “Thank you, Draco.” she said.

“I understand this is your father’s vault.” Unspeakable Wilson said, she looked at Draco for a few moments, as though lost in thought.

“Yes.” he replied simply. Tsking, Unspeakable Wilson nodded her head. “I hope that will not cloud your judgement, Auror Malfoy.” Draco snorted, shaking his head. The statement had caught him a little off guard. The majority of the Ministry knew his disdain for his father, however he wasn’t sure how far that knowledge stretched.

“I couldn’t care less about my father.” he replied simply. Unspeakable Wilson pursed her lips, before nodding and turning her attention back to the Minister.

Kingsley let out a sigh, shuffling the parchment around on his desk. “Scan the artifact, Zabini I trust you can inspect the vault without assistance?” Blaise nodded curtly. “Right, well dismissed, we will reconvene tomorrow.” 

Harry let out a breath he didn’t realise he was holding and they all exited the office together. Once outside, Hermione placed a gentle hand on Draco’s bicep and smiled. “This is good, Draco, it’s helpful.” he wasn’t sure why she felt the need for reassurance, but all Draco could think about was a good firewhiskey and his favourite dolphin program.

“Home?” he sighed, turning towards Harry. Harry smiled and nodded, holding his arm out for Draco to take. “Home sounds great.”


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A massive thank you to my beta for this chapter, the amazing, the wonderful Mir @BlackAngelSpade

When Harry entered the Ministry of Magic the next day, he had an overwhelming sense of anxiety bubbling in the pit of his stomach. Not only had they found Celtic Serpent evidence in Lucius Malfoy’s private vault, they also had the Deathly Hallows element to contest with. It was times like these that Harry wondered why he became an Auror. Although he was a damn good Auror, he often wondered to himself why he’d decided to dedicate his entire life from start to finish fighting dark wizards. It was a constant sense of irritation to him. The loss of his best friend on his team saddened him greatly, although he had Draco he couldn’t kick the feeling he was missing someone when he entered the Ministry.

Walking next to him, Draco looked as lost in thought as Harry was. Since they’d found the Celtic Serpent trinket box in Lucius’ vault, the other man has seemed distracted, on edge. Draco worked damn hard to prove himself to the Ministry, they were ready to throw the towel in and declare him more of a nuisance than he was worth. After all, how could the Ministry of Magic protect people if those people didn’t trust them? For all Draco had proved himself, there were people who didn’t quite agree with an ex-Death Eater being a part of the Ministry. 

“Are you alright?” Harry asked in a hushed tone, eyes narrowed. Draco stopped, looked at Harry for a moment and then grimaced. “I think so.” he replied, trying as hard as he could to steady his voice. In truth, Draco was just teetering on the edge of a mental breakdown. He’d received an anonymous owl this morning, it had woken him up. He’d gotten out of bed quick enough that it didn’t wake up Harry, who slept peacefully next to him.

He had it in his breast pocket, folded neatly. His heart began to race wildly as he’d read it. He reached into his pocket, his fingers tracing the edges of the paper. He thought about showing it to Harry before they entered the Ministry, but he chickened out at the last possible moment. He knew Harry would be angry, so instead he kept it to himself.

“Are you sure?” Harry asked, eyeing him with suspicion. Draco nodded, chewing on his bottom lip. They’d been friends long enough that Harry knew him by heart. All of his tells, he couldn’t lie to the other man. Though one of the best things about Harry was he’d never press. They walked into the Auror department side by side. Harry’s eyes wandered to Lavender who was looking at a piece of parchment, a report by the looks of it. Harry frowned. Lavender’s eyebrows were raised, eyes crinkling at the edges.

“Morning everyone.” he said evenly, nodding his head towards Seamus who was resting on the edge of his own desk. Dean close beside him. Beside Lavender sat Henderson. Draco cleared his throat and nodded towards Dean and Seamus. “Morning Sir.” Endelton said, sitting to the right of him. 

Lavender’s eyes wandered to Harry, she looked as though she was going to say something so Harry waited expectantly. However she ducked her head down and began scribbling something on a scrap of parchment that lay next to her. Once she’d finished, she walked quickly over to Harry and passed him the offending parchment. He nodded his head and stepped back.   
Harry’s brows furrowed as he walked towards his office, unfolding the parchment and scanning it quickly. 

_I have something against those Celtic Serpents, I don’t know if you’re still looking into that case, but you might want to see this. L_

His head shot up, turning in Lavender’s direction. He gestured for her to enter his office and opened the door, slipping inside. Lavender jogged back to her desk and pulled a few files off her tray, then made her way quickly towards Harry and Draco’s office, closing the door behind her.

Draco stood glued to the spot, watching the exchange with interest. Lavender was a damn good Auror but they didn’t converse much, he had the feeling that the girl wasn’t much of a chatter. Which amused him considering how vocal she was at Hogwarts. “Right, what’ve we got today then?” Draco asked, turning his head towards Dean who smiled.

“Mrs. Dunn’s reported someone’s stolen her aubergines this time, there’s a witch in Hogsmeade that’s reported someone broke into her house - also there’s a crop circle here.” Dean shrugged, handing the reports to Draco who accepted them eagerly.

He wasn’t that interested in whatever vegetable Mrs. Dunn had stolen today, nor was he interested in the prospect of a break in, but he was definitely interested in the crop circle. He quickly read the report of the crop circle, quite small in a small village just outside York - however, it was quite close to the last one which peaked his interest even more.

“Has anyone been out about this crop circle yet?” asked Draco, frowning. Seamus nodded his head and stood up. “Nah not yet, we were going to have a look but we wanted to wait for you two first.” Draco nodded in response. Chewing his lower lip, he turned his head towards the office door and sighed. “Well whatever they’re doing is private and important so how about us three go and check it out?” 

Seamus grinned enthusiastically and grabbed his robes, which were slung over the back of his office chair. Dean was immaculately dressed which always impressed Draco. “Right, coordinates are here, I’ll meet you there.” Draco said, before disapparating. 

\-----

Upon apparition, Draco, Seamus and Dean were immediately embroiled in an intense wand fight. Seamus clocked a wizard who seemed to be hanging in the back, casting a complicated series of wand movements, he couldn’t hear what the person was mumbling. Feeling a shift under his feet, Dean’s eyes darted to Draco who had just been hit by a Stupefy. “Fuck!” cursed Dean, running over to the blonde. “Draco!” he shouted, kneeling down beside him he cast a Protego around them and checked Draco’s pulse, he’d hit his head pretty hard on a rock jutting out of the bladed grass. Seamus cast a Protego around himself, he looked down to his wristwatch and pressed a button on the front. They’d been issued them two months before, some new invention they’d come up with for Aurors. It had been pretty irritating really, Seamus didn’t like watches or bracelets, he’d argued the toss when they’d been given them but now in the heat of battle he couldn’t help but feel a little grateful, perhaps a little ashamed of the amount of moaning he did about the particular bit of kit. Looking up quickly, his quickly made a note of the headcount, there was one perp in front of him, full black hooded robe. To the person’s left there was another perp in full black, hooded cape. The man to the left looked a little different to the person straight ahead. Seamus made a mental note that this particular wizard was male, which he could tell by the build but he had gold piping around the edge of his robe.

All of the Celtic Serpents they’d met up until now had been clad in full black. If this one had gold piping he needed to make an effort to capture him. With one team member down and the other tending to him, Seamus had no idea how he’d take four Celtic Serpents down, let alone capture this one. He exhaled, they finally got through his Protego. 

“Stupefy!” Seamus bellowed, hitting the person in front full pelt in the chest, he propelled backwards hitting the grass with impressive force. Seamus turned his attention to the man to the left, who seemed to be coming towards him. He quickly cast another Protego around him and shuffled towards Dean. “I’m going to need your help.” he shouted, eyes wild.

Dean nodded in agreement, he’d cast several charms on Draco and then finally finished with stasis. He stood up quickly, pointing his wand to the man in gold piping. The man lowered his hood, a cruel smirk on his face. Auror Lockwood.

“Lockwood, you fucking traitor!” Seamus growled. Dean moved closer to Seamus and whispered “There’s an anti apparition charm all around this area, I tried to side-along Draco, but it didn’t work.” he kept his eyes on Lockwood at all times. Seamus idly wondered if the cloaked person casting in the back had set up the anti apparition charm. He cursed under his breath.

Seamus could feel his heart hammering in his chest, adrenaline kicking in. He had no idea how they were going to get out of this one. From the distance he could already see at least six of the Celtic Serpents gaining. He shook his head in dismay.

“What the fuck are we going to do?” mumbled Seamus. Dean shook his head in response, unable to reply. “It seems you’ve found yourselves stuck here, Auror Finnigan.” Lockwood spat, his mouth twisted into a sick smile. 

Looking down at his watch again, Seamus realised one thing. Auror Lockwood would’ve had one too. He thought back to the meeting they’d had when they were told how to use them, he remembered it registered coordinates of other Aurors at all times whilst the watch was being worn. Which meant Lockwood always knew where the others were. No wonder they always got away. A shift beside him caught Seamus’ eye, Draco began stirring. Dean quickly removed the stasis charm and knelt next to his fallen friend. “Are you alright?” he asked quietly.

Draco opened his eyes, squinting at the light. The most indescribable pain like a lead brick pressed against his temple. “Ughh” he moaned, bringing his hand up to his head. “What the fuck..” he whispered. Pulling himself up onto his knees, Draco noticed Auror Lockwood studying him. Draco’s eyes went wide. “Fuck, what the..” he was caught off by the sound of pounding feet only somewhat muffled by the grassy field. He turned his head and spotted Harry, relief flooding through his entire body.

“Draco!” Harry shouted, running as fast as he could to his partner. Harry had been in an intense discussion with Lavender about her findings when his wristwatch went off, he’d walked out to an empty room. Not even Endelton or Henderson were present. He’d found a report on Seamus’ desk and tried to apparate to the coordinates. When it rebounded, himself and Lavender had been looking up maps to find areas nearby they could apparate to. 

When they’d finished research, Endelton and Henderson had reentered the department frantically, asking what was going on with their wristwatches. If Harry was truthful, nobody had ever used them before now. They’d all apparated together. 

Once Harry had reached Draco, he immediately fell to his knees and placed a gentle hand on Draco’s shoulder. “Are you alright?” he whispered, his eyes immediately settling on the gash and the seeping blood painting his blond hair. “Merlin Draco..” he reached out, but immediately withdrew his hand when he noticed Draco’s preemptive wince. Endelton and Henderson had reached them and stood beside Dean and Seamus, wands raised.

Finally, Lavender reached them looking a little worse for wear, she let out a cough - Harry’s eyes scanned the area, he stood up quickly when he realised more Celtic Serpents were behind them. “Shit.” he cursed, shaking his head. Only one of them incapacitated, Harry could see at least three behind. Lavender gestured her hand dismissively, already guessing what Harry would ask.

“More of you here, more to maim it seems.” Lockwood laughed maniacally, Draco winced at the tone. The only other time he’d heard that sick laugh was from the Dark Lord himself. Lockwood was clearly off his rocker. “I can’t wait to see how you bleed.” Lockwood smirked, staring at Harry as though he was the most delicious meal. “I didn’t realise you were that way inclined, Lockwood.” Harry retorted, rolling his eyes. This only seemed to anger the man further, he began walking slowly towards Harry - the glint in his eye unsettled Dean who moved to clutch Seamus’ hand. 

“You’re wasting time.” came a voice from Lockwood’s right, the cloaked wizard who had spent the entire exchange casting had walked towards Lockwood, his tone was cold, uninterested. “Let’s just get this done.”   
Lockwood growled, turning towards the man. “It’s done when I say so.” he spat, glaring daggers. Harry frowned, he had no idea how he could’ve ever missed this. Lockwood was clearly deranged but in the office he seemed so mellow, normal, he had been a decent enough Auror - though Draco often moaned about his ‘shit paperwork skills’ he’d never had a problem with the man before. Harry was sure after all of the dark wizards he’d encountered during the war he’d be able to spot another one, he felt a pang of guilt. 

Draco lifted his wand towards Lockwood, his hands clenching the wood as though he’d drop it any minute. He could feel his headache increasing, his vision blurry. ‘Do not pass out’ he willed himself. “Petrificus Totalus!” he bellowed, hitting Lockwood in the back before he succumbed to the darkness.

Harry’s head snapped towards Draco as Auror Lockwood went down, he was both extremely proud of his partner and horribly worried. Dean and Seamus immediately began gaining on the wizard in front of them, Harry turned around and held his wand up to the three in the back who had begun backing up. “You get the left, I’ll get the right.” Harry ordered quickly, jogging towards the perp on the right. 

Dean began casting a series of curses at the wizard, almost perfectly in sync with his boyfriend's movements. Seamus finally broke through the man’s shield, casting a Stupefy that hit him right in the crotch. Seamus let out a bark of laughter, throwing his head back. “I did it! I finally did it!” he shouted as Dean ran to the man. He cast a quick incarcerous around the man in question and rolled his eyes at the other man. “Seriously, Seamus?” he mumbled, shaking his head. He couldn’t help the smile that crept onto his lips.

“I bet you 10 galleons 8 months ago that I’d hit someone in the dick with a Stupefy. You owe me 10 galleons now Deano.” he put his hands on his hips, looking proudly at his boyfriend. “You idiot, your money is my money.” Dean rolled his eyes again. 

“Yeah, so? That’s 10 galleons that is one hundred percent mine.” he grinned. Nobody could take this moment away from him. Dean turned his attention to Lockwood, who Endelton had bound with an Incarcerous. “Good work Josh.” he said, nodding his head. Endelton wasn’t his cup of tea, the man was just far too irritating for Dean’s taste and that was saying something. 

“Thanks.” Endelton grinned. Henderson jogged towards Draco, kneeling down beside the blond. “I think we need to get Auror Malfoy to St. Mungo’s now.” she said, a note of worry in her voice. Harry had bound his perp, unfortunately the other two had gotten away. The anti apparition charm had been broken the second Seamus had brought down the back wizard. The other Celtic Serpents that had been behind had vanished too. 

“At least we have three.” nodded Lavender, they made their way towards Draco and levitated him up. Harry bit his bottom lip hard. “I’ll take Draco to St. Mungos, Dean, you and Seamus take him to the Ministry” He gestured his head towards the man they’d taken, with Seamus’ impressive crotch Stupefy. “Lavender you take Lockwood, Endelton and Henderson take the one back there. Put Lockwood in maximum security, the rest in the holding cells.” He pointed over his shoulder at the perp he’d taken down. Watching the expressions of his team, there was no way he could keep any of them out of the loop now. He’d told Kingsley his team worked better when they were all together. Without Lavender today he’d not have been able to do what he had. She was an invaluable member of his team. He smiled fondly at the woman beside him. 

They all nodded in response. Harry let out a deep breath. “Come on Draco, let’s go.” he whispered, his voice quivering. Now it was all over, all he could feel was worry. What if Draco never woke up? That was the constant question going through his mind as he apparated to St Mungos.

\----------------

Harry had landed bang in the middle of St. Mungo’s entrance building. His spell began fading, instead of recasting it Harry moved forwards and wrapped his arms under Draco’s frail body, carrying him through the double doors. “Auror down!” he bellowed, signalling towards the Healers on duty. 

They moved towards him with impressive speed, casting a series of status spells over Draco’s body. Harry looked down at the man in his arms, fighting back the tears that threatened to escape. Dark thoughts began to plague Harry’s mind, what would he do without Draco? If he died, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to carry on. “Please help him.” he choked out, tears began to flow freely down his cheeks, dropping on to Draco’s blood stained robes. 

The healers levitated Draco out of his arms and moved him through the stark white corridors and through teal blue double doors off to the right. Harry followed them, but he was stopped by the Healer in charge. “Please wait here, Sir.” he said, before disappearing through the doors.

Harry swallowed, wiping his cheeks with the back of his hand. He sat down on the linoleum floor, his back to the wall. He brought his knees up to his chest and took a deep breath. All he could do now was wait, if Kingsley summoned him back to the Ministry he’d tell him under no uncertain terms to fuck right off.

He would wait, however long it takes. Even if that was forever.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's so late, I've had quite a few personal problems lately. Next chapter is coming very soon.

It had been six hours since Draco was admitted to St Mungos. Harry had paced up and down the corridor, consumed more coffee from the lackluster vending machine than he should’ve and had several visits from different people. The first being Lavender who’d come straight to the hospital from the Ministry.

Lavender had come to report straight to Harry about Lockwood. Once she’d entered the Ministry, her plan was to take him straight to Auror holding, however she’d been intercepted by Unspeakable Wilson. Instead of Auror holding, she’d taken him straight to the secure facility within the Department of Mysteries. Lavender had protested, but Kingsley had informed her that was where Lockwood would remain. The other two perps were in Auror holding, but Lavender had explained to the Unspeakables that one of them was far more advanced than the others.

Unspeakable Wilson had taken the perp in question to an interrogation room immediately, accompanied by Unspeakable Zabini who’d scowled at Lavender as he entered. Lavender didn’t like Zabini much - she’d spoken to him maybe two times and it was usually at Dean and Seamus’ annual reunion. The man seemed pompous and irritating at the best of times, something she didn’t care for.

When she told Harry the details, he’d looked less than interested. She’d speculated Harry cared far more deeply for Draco than anyone knew. Lavender had watched Harry and Draco’s interactions, she was an Auror, of course. Trained to spot things normal people were unaware of, they were so deeply connected. Lavender hoped she’d find love like that one day. Dean and Seamus had arrived shortly after explaining Henderson and Endelton were in the Minister’s office, being briefed on the Celtic Serpent case. Harry let out a sigh of relief that his team would be part of the operation, the whole team. They couldn’t do it without them. 

Harry had sat back down on the linoleum floor, his boots squeaking as he slid down. He kept shifting his boot against the floor, wincing at each squeak. “How is he?” a voice came from beside him. Harry turned his head and frowned. “Hermione? What are you doing here?” he asked, wondering how long she’d been sitting there before she spoke. Harry hadn’t noticed her entrance, though since Hermione had joined the Unspeakables she was even sneakier than before. The thought amused him, Ron often complained about it.

“A little while ago, the Healers won’t tell me much.” she sighed. Harry nodded in agreement, shaking his head. “They told me he’s stable, but that’s about it. They won’t tell me anymore than that - I’m not _family_ ” he spat, rolling his eyes. Hermione snorted, mimicking his movements, her hair bouncing as she shook her head. “It’s ridiculous isn’t it, you spend more time with Draco than any other person alive, and vice versa, but you’re not allowed to know if he’s alright.” 

Harry cleared his throat, looking up at the door in front of him once again. “He’s going to be alright, isn’t he ‘Mione?” his voice faltered, he was trying so hard to hold back the tears threatening to fall. A sympathetic look flitted over Hermione’s features, placing a comforting hand on his shoulder, she nodded her head. At this point, nobody really knew whether Draco would be fine or not. “Of course.” she tried as hard as she could to support him, but she could tell Harry was falling apart with each passing hour. Six hours was far too long to wait for an update. Hermione walked over to the door, knocking on smooth wood gently. 

The door swung open, a Healer in scrubs stood there blinking at the sight before him. “Can I help you?” the man asked, raising an eyebrow at Hermione. “Hello, I’m Unspeakable Hermione Granger,” she started, flashing him what she’d hoped was a genuine smile. “On behalf of the Ministry of Magic I’ve been sent here by the Minister of Magic Kingsley Shacklebolt to request an update on the status of Auror Draco Malfoy.” her heart was hammering in her chest. If the Healer contacted the Ministry they’d know it was bogus, all she had to hope was this was enough.

The Healer before her spluttered, nodding his head quickly. “I’m sorry Unspeakable, yes, I’ll get you that information right now.” he rambled quickly. Hermione heard the squeak of Harry’s boots again, narrowing her eyes to his direction. “You’re brilliant.” he whispered, suddenly appearing at her side. The Healer returned with Draco’s charts, gesturing for the two of them to enter the department. “You do realise the man waiting outside is Harry Potter, right?” Hermione then added, giving the Healer in charge a withering look. The Healer cleared his throat, gave Harry a look and looked down at the chart in his hands.

Hermione could tell the man was nervous, his hands shook maybe a little more than what would be considered normal. Hermione made a noise in the back of her throat, feigning impatience. Harry knew she rarely threw her weight around, but desperate times and all that.

“I apologise, Mr. Potter.” the man stammered, passing the chart in his hands towards Hermione, who took it willingly. She began to scan the chart, eyes widening. Harry rubbed the back of his neck, waiting for her response. “Mr. Malfoy is stable, but he’s not out of the woods yet.” 

Harry nodded, chewing his bottom lip in thought. Hermione let out a sigh and looked up at the Healer. “I talked to Dean while I was in the Ministry, he said Malfoy was hit by a Stupefy.” her brows furrowed, she shook her head. “This is curse damage, there’s no way that was from a Stupefy.”

Harry frowned, turning his attention to the Healer. “I can assure you, we have examined Mr. Malfoy thoroughly - what he’s suffering from is a curse that has affected his nerve endings.” the Healer held his hand out for the chart, which Hermione handed back reluctantly. “He was hit by a Stupefy, I can confirm,” the man started, laying the chart down on the ledge beside him. “But he was definitely hit by something else afterwards, which has resulted in the curse damage, you said he was coherent after he hit his head, yes?” 

Harry nodded in agreement, his mind flashing back to Draco’s frail form lying unconscious in the field. “He was hit by a Stupefy, which propelled him backwards - he hit his head off a rock jutting out of the grass, he woke up briefly and cast a Petrificus Totalus on a perp, to which he then passed out.” he frowned, turning his head towards Hermione. She held her hands up “I wasn’t there, but you can’t get curse damage unless perhaps the rock itself was covered in something?” she then shook her head. “I can’t really say either way, I haven’t heard of a concoction that causes damage to nerve endings.” 

“Has he woken up yet?” Harry asked, finally turning his attention back to the Healer. The man nodded his head, he then frowned and turned his back to the two of them. “Wait,” he mumbled, before jogging towards another Healer at the end of the ward.

Harry sighed. “Well that was weird.” Harry commented, rolling his eyes. He really hated St. Mungos.

\---------------------------

Harry waited for about fifteen minutes before he got impatient and wandered down the corridor. Hermione followed him, turning her head as they passed each door. A nauseous feeling settled in the pit of her stomach, she’d been here before. This was the ward where people who were in critical condition were placed. A year ago, one of the Unspeakables she worked with - a good friend of Rose Wilson had been brought here after a raid went wrong. Of course the Unspeakables don’t usually get there until everything is over, or generally not at all. They’d entered a back room assumed to have been checked where their colleague had been hit by a nasty curse. 

It was the first time Hermione had ever seen Unspeakable Wilson show any sort of emotion. The woman had immediately dived down, uncaring for her personal safety to attend to her friend. Hermione often wondered if there was more to their relationship than meets the eye, it wasn’t rare for Unspeakables to have personal relationships - they spent a lot of time together and really the only people you could talk to about the job were each other.

It always hurt Hermione that she couldn’t discuss anything with Ron. After all, they’d been through so much together. Ron simply didn’t ask anymore, which Hermione wasn’t sure whether she was comfortable with. He spent a lot of time away from her now, over the past week he’d spent almost all of his time in the Wheezes shop - which was nice, but she missed being able to walk down a few corridors and spend her lunch break with him. 

Harry stopped outside the last door at the end of the corridor, taking in a breath he reached out and turned the door handle, stepping inside the room. His eyes immediately rested on Draco’s frail, unmoving form. Harry felt sick, just yesterday they’d been having an albeit weird, but lovely day together. 

Hermione followed him into the room and closed the door behind them. Immediately walking over to the chart at the end of Draco’s bed, she picked it up and began scanning it. It wasn’t different to the one the Healer gave her earlier, but she wondered if they’d kept something from her. Hermione often worried that Draco would be refused treatment because of his status during the war. 

“Same as the other one.” she said when she caught Harry’s eyes on her. He nodded. “Right.” Harry walked towards the bed, settling on Draco’s right side. The sides of his hair still covered in blood, but he was now wearing St. Mungo’s pyjamas. Harry frowned. “Why didn’t they clean him up?” he asked, his eyes narrowing. Hermione sighed, “They probably didn’t want to touch the wound.” she offered, sitting down on a wooden chair near the window.

Harry nodded and wrapped his hand around Draco’s, he moved a strand of hair out of the other man’s face and sighed. Hermione watched him, pursing her lips. 

\---------------------------

“What do you mean we can’t interview them?!” exclaimed Lavender, she stood in the doorway of Kingsley’s office, frazzled and tired but she refused to budge - to go home. Lavender had never seen such a destroyed Harry Potter in her life. Not at Hogwarts, not during training, never. This was important and she would see it through to the end.

“The Unspeakables will be questioning the suspects.” Kingsley said evenly, smoothing down the papers on his desk. He stood up and eyed Lavender. The woman let out a noise of protest, shaking her head. “This is ridiculous, we brought them in,” she growled. “The Unspeakables have Lockwood in their department, why can’t we bloody well question the suspects we have in _our_ department?” 

Kingsley let out a sigh, rubbing his forehead. “I can’t authorise you to question the suspects, the Unspeakables want to interview them first. However I can let you sit in.” he offered, Lavender was a wild card, feisty and unmovable, he’d been overjoyed when she joined training. The woman fought well during the war, she’d recovered well and she’d even taken in a few war orphans whilst the Ministry found them suitable homes to go to. Lavender was quiet, but strong. 

“Yes, I suppose that’ll be fine,” she grumbled, nodding her head. Kingsley could tell she wasn’t thoroughly pleased with the idea, but nonetheless accepting. “I’d like to go back to the hospital and see how Harry is doing.” she announced. After nodding his head, Kingsley gestured for her to go. Lavender offered a small smile, bowed her head and exited the doorway, closing the door behind her.

“Hi Lav, how are you doing?” asked Henderson, who was walking up the corridor as Lavender left. Turning her head in Jeanette’s direction, Lavender smiled. “Hello,” she walked towards Jean and wrapped her arms around her, pulling her into a tight hug. “I’m okay.” she whispered, burying her head in the other woman’s hair. “Harry is devastated.” sighing, Lavender pulled back a little, her eyes meeting Jean’s. 

“I can imagine so.” replied Jean, shaking her head. “They’re very close.” Lavender nodded, frowning. “I’m about to go to the hospital, do you want to come with me?” Jean let out a sigh and shook her head. “I want to, but I can’t,” she turned her head towards Endelton, who stood by the end of the corridor, shifting his feet around. He looked uncomfortable and out of place. “Got to take care of Endelton, he’s shit at situations like this.” Lavender snorted, nodding her head.

“I’ll see you later then?” she smiled at Jean, who returned her smile. “Of course.”

\-----------------------------

Hermione had left a little under an hour ago, Harry had only realised she left when Healer Jenkins had entered the room, he’d cast a series of status charms on Draco’s body and scribbled something down on the notes at the end of his bed. He’d only learnt the man’s name from another Healer who shouted for him and he quickly left. Harry sat staring at Draco intently. Almost willing him to wake up. After Jenkins had left, Harry began talking - he’d read somewhere that even when people were unconscious they could still hear people talking, or something.

“So, if you don’t wake up I won’t ever let you watch your documentaries ever again, no dolphins, no pharaohs, no sad doggies needing rescuing.” he announced, staring at Draco’s face - he wanted just a flicker of _something_ “If you were awake you’d say something clever like,” he began to use his best Draco impression “You idiot, you can’t use that as a threat, if I don’t wake up then how the bloody hell can I watch television?” Harry laughed a little, but his expression soon changed to a scowl. “Draco wake up, Merlin what the fuck am I going to do without you?” he huffed, slouching back into his chair. He leant his head back staring up at the clinically white ceiling. “I can’t believe I’m sitting in St Mungos and I’m not the one injured,” he sighed. “It’s always me that gets fucked over, why does it have to be you?” 

“I’m as surprised as you are.” came a voice from beside him, Harry turned his attention to the doorway, a small smile gracing his lips as his eyes rest on Lavender. “Hey, what are you doing here?” asked Harry, he began chewing on his lower lip. His immediate thoughts went to the Serpents they arrested, he began to frown. “Did something go wrong?”

Lavender shook her head, walking further into the room. She took the chair Hermione had sat on previously and studied Draco’s form, letting out a sigh. “No, Kingsley said we’re not allowed to interrogate the scumbags - Unspeakables need to do it.” she spat the last part, clenching her hands into fists. “Doesn’t surprise me.” Harry shrugged. 

“Me neither, still fucking annoying though.” she narrowed her eyes, her gaze wandered to Draco’s hair. “Why’s he still covered in blood?” 

Harry let out a laugh “I asked the same thing, something to do with curse damage can’t touch them bollocks.” he shrugged. Lavender frowned, leaning back in her chair. “Right.” 

They sat in silence for around twenty minutes before Healer Jenkins and another healer Harry hadn’t met before entered the room. The woman walked towards Draco’s bed, pulled her wand out and cast an incantation, Harry watched confused and awed at the same time. His entire body illuminated with specks of gold and silver, before dulling down, turning to a deep red.

“You’re right.” the new Healer announced, nodding her head towards Jenkins. “Hmm,” he nodded, the faraway gaze in his eyes once again. Harry couldn’t help the irritation that flared. “Well, what is it?” Harry grumbled. 

“During the war, a lot of Death Eaters liked to use a curse, to this day we have no idea what it’s called,” the healer pursed her lips, her bottom lip curling in disgust “I’ve seen it kill three people.” sighing, she turned her head towards Harry. “It’s a rather slow and painful death, but if it’s caught quick enough we can reverse it.” 

Harry exhaled, turning his head towards Draco. “Nobody saw him get hit by anything though.” Harry frowned, he tried to think of everything that had happened today, the previous day, his mind spun, he sighed. “I found this in Mr. Malfoy’s robe pockets, perhaps it may help you?” Healer Jenkins offered. Passing over a piece of parchment, Harry’s fingers curled around it, crumpling it slightly.

“Harry are you alright?” asked Lavender, her tone was soft, something that didn’t usually come from the woman. Harry nodded slowly, a pained smile directed towards her. “Yes, thank you.” he whispered. Harry thought back to Lucius Malfoy’s vault. They’d seen the trinket box together, but Draco had been the one to shield it and bring it to the Ministry. “Lavender,” he started, he frowned the overwhelming sense that he’d forgotten something - he clicked his fingers. Harry’s eyes then widened. “Lavender, can you go to the Ministry, ask for a meeting with Unspeakable Wilson, the box, the box we recovered from the vault. Ask Unspeakable Wilson if she’s scanned it.” Harry gave her a knowing look, Lavender nodded and stood up.

“I’ll be back as soon as I can.” she said simply, jogging out of the hospital room. “You’ll let us know if you find anything, yes?” the healer asked, turning towards Harry. “Yes, if it helps Draco,” Harry sighed. “What’s your name?” the woman let out a laugh and smiled. “Healer Lana Williamson.” she nodded.

“Thank you, I’m going to get back to the Ministry and see if I can find anything myself. Please alert me if anything happens.” Harry stood up and brushed off his robes, offering a small smile towards Jenkins and Williamson before apparating with a pop.

\------------------------

When Harry entered the Ministry, he let out a sigh. It felt wrong being here without Draco, he was a constant in his life. He felt nothing but a hollow shell without the man he cared so much for. Harry had decided whilst sitting in St. Mungo’s staring at Draco’s unmoving form that when he woke up he’d tell him, he’d tell him everything.

Opening the door to his office, he slipped inside and closed it gently behind him. He really didn’t want to be disturbed, he needed to look through every piece of information again. Harry could all but memorise every single piece of it, but he needed to do this, for Draco.

He sat down at his desk and sighed, something that had become a habit recently. He unbuttoned his Auror robes and slung them across the back of his office chair. He suddenly remembered the parchment he’d shoved in his pocket, he pulled it out and smoothed it down. It looked like it had been opened and folded over several times. 

Harry bit his lower lip and unfolded it, scanning the words on the paper. His eyes widened, he shot up out of his chair and ran towards the office door, pulling it open with such force it almost propelled shut again. “WHERE’S ENDELTON?” he bellowed, moving through the department quickly.

Harry looked furious, his cheeks blotchy red with anger. “Where the buggering fuck is Endelton?” he shouted as he wrenched the door to Kingsley’s office open. Kingsley stood up quickly, wand drawn. The Minister’s hand hovering over the Ministry’s panic button, which was installed just after Harry’s visit to the Department of Mysteries. It was an amusing story really, apparently a group of teenagers managing to get into the Department of Mysteries was unsettling, but the Dark Lord himself was enough cause to install it. Upon pressing it, the Ministry would be enveloped in a site wide Anti-Disapparation charm, as well as horribly loud alarms that gave Harry a bloody headache. “Harry, you nearly gave me a heart attack.” the man stated, shaking his head. “Please don’t do that again, I haven’t seen Endelton, why do you ask?” he let out a breath, if a little shaky. 

Harry walked in, shut the door behind him and tossed the parchment down on Kingsley’s desk. The man frowned, picked it up and began to read.

“We need to find Endelton.” he stated simply.

Harry growled. “Now.” his hand then slammed down on the lockdown button. Kingsley nodded.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologise it's taken so long to update this, here's the newest chapter. I'm hoping to get the next one out soon so we can finish this fic. Thank you so much for baring with me!

Kingsley and Harry scoured the entire Ministry. The front of the building had a ward sealed around the door that shimmered in the light. Five Aurors were guarding the front door, and one Auror at every exit. Harry frowned, running a hand through his hair. They’d looked everywhere, Harry had attempted to use his watch to find Endelton’s location but to no avail. He was running out of time and he could feel panic rising. “Do we know who wrote the note?” Kingsley asked, turning his head towards Harry. They were standing in the middle of the entrance, Harry looked up at the giant silver chandelier above, closing his eyes briefly. “The only ones that know of the box's existence are the Unspeakables, Dean and Seamus and Draco.” he sighed. 

Kingsley pursed his lips, he looked thoughtful. His purple robes billowed around him, it reminded Harry often of Dumbledore, the way Kingsley held himself. “What about Narcissa Malfoy, it was her husbands vault after all.” he frowned, rubbing his chin. Harry turned his head towards the Minister, he wasn’t sure Narcissa would be capable of casting a curse on a piece of parchment, it was complicated. When they’d entered the Department of Mysteries not ten minutes earlier, Harry had immediately sought out Hermione and briefed her on the situation. Hermione had taken the parchment to Wilson, who was an expert at curse detection. She’d ascertained the parchment did hold a curse, but whatever it had been it would’ve transferred to the recipient as soon as they read it. Wilson concluded there was nothing left on the parchment itself. 

The piece of parchment Draco had on his person _did_ anger Harry, but it was the fact Draco had not told him that hurt the most. It was written in perfect handwriting, not too different to Draco’s but Harry had spent enough time and read enough of Draco’s writing to know it wasn’t his.

It simply said, ‘Malfoy and Endelton are to die tonight, traitors.’ the twists and turns reminded him of Tom Riddle’s diary, Harry couldn’t help the sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach. He wondered if Endelton had received a similar piece. The thought that Draco’s own mother would’ve done something like this was absurd. He thought back to that night in the forest, his skin prickling. Although it was complicated, he was sure Narcissa was a competent witch. The thought of it being her made him feel uneasy however.

“Narcissa is in France, also I don’t think she would’ve done this.” Harry admitted, shaking his head. “She sends Draco letters a lot, we go and visit.” he ran a hand through his hair. Narcissa Malfoy was a complicated woman and although she loved Draco dearly he felt every time he saw her that she could see straight through him, to his soul. Narcissa had stated one day whilst they wandered through the vineyard together she knew Harry loved Draco. He’d looked at her quickly, a blush staining his cheeks. From then on, she cast him knowing looks, or he caught a small smile whenever she watched the two of them.

Kingsley sighed. “We need to talk to her anyway Harry, you know this.” Harry nodded, he felt guilty. He’d not even told Narcissa that Draco was in hospital yet. He’d told nobody, he didn’t want to, he just wanted to be with him. “I haven’t told her he’s in hospital yet, neither Andromeda.” 

Kingsley walked forwards, towards the staircase in front of them and turned his head. “Well, now is as good as you’re going to get.” the Minister stated, before he walked out of sight. Harry looked around, scanning the faces of Aurors around them. He wandered over to Henderson who was appointed to guard the front doors and leaned forwards “Henderson, please send an owl to Narcissa Malfoy about Draco’s state, mention nothing but request a firecall with her.” it came out as a whisper, she nodded and turned on her heel. 

“Endelton, where the fuck are you?” he mumbled under his breath. If he didn’t get to him in time he’d be as good as dead, the only reason Draco wasn’t dead right now was purely to do with their timing.

****

“Unspeakable Hermione Granger, interviewing ex-Auror Jack Lockwood, accompanying me is Unspeakable Rose Wilson, Unspeakable Blaise Zabini and Auror Lavender Brown.” she stated, the man sat shackled to the deep gray stone table in front, he looked dishevelled, he’d been changed into Azkaban pyjamas, she smoothed her hand over the parchment placed neatly on the table and took in a deep breath.

“Mr. Lockwood, you are a part of the Celtic Serpent group, correct?” she asked, her voice was even and controlled. Lavender sat at the back, silently praising Hermione for not just hurling herself over the table and smashing his face in. Merlin knows she’d like to do that.

He sneered at her, licking his lips. “Am I not entitled to legal counsel?” he asked bitterly, the edges of his mouth turned up into a sickening smile. Lavender was briefly reminded of the way Fenrir Greyback looked at her, all those years ago. It sent a chill up her back.

“Unfortunately Mr. Lockwood, when you’re brought into the Ministry under suspicion of terror attacks, you’re not entitled to legal counsel. You can thank Kingsley Shacklebolt for that.” Hermione had argued about that particular law, it unsettled her. Some of the Death Eaters had been children, forced into servitude by their misguided parents. Draco had winced when he heard of the law, but he simply stated if someone was caught or they had solid proof they were acting against the Ministry and the Wizarding World in terror attacks, they deserved it. Hermione couldn’t help but feel it was wrong though.

“Oh well,” he laughed. Lockwood leant forwards, licking his lips again. Hermione felt deeply uncomfortable, she turned her head towards Wilson who was the epitome of cool and impassive, she couldn’t help but feel impressed by her colleague. “Yes, I suppose I am.” he finally said, he eyed up Hermione - she felt suddenly sick, as though he was eyeing her for his next meal. Lavender had written the exact same thing in her report of their capture. It was an accurate description of this man.

“You caught me.” he said, stifling a laugh and holding his hands up in mock surrender. Unspeakable Wilson let out a huff and rolled her eyes. “You’re a petulant idiot aren’t you?” the cold tone in her voice made Hermione wince inwardly. “What were you doing in that field?” asked Wilson, staring at him intently. 

Lockwood didn’t stifle his laugh this time, he went into a full on laughing fit, enough so he started to cough. Hermione could hear the man was dehydrated, his throat sounded croaky and painful as he did so.

“What do you think I was doing?” He asked, his tone mocking, his eyes sparkled with mischief. Wilson stood up, ready to lunge at the man - held back by Lavender who placed a gentle hand on Wilson’s arm. “He’s not worth it,” Lavender whispered, her eyes searching Wilson’s face. “Let it go.” 

Hermione rarely saw the woman react to anything, she wondered what had happened to Rose to make her act this brash. The interview waned on with the usual questions, however none of which were answered coherently by Lockwood, who preferred to make it into a joke. After twenty minutes, Hermione ended the interview and ordered the guard to take Lockwood back to his cell.

“That didn’t go well,” Lavender sighed, running a hand through her hair. They were all frustrated at this point, Lavender’s thoughts kept going back to the distressed look on Harry’s face at the prospect of losing Draco, it pained her deep in her heart.

****

Sat at his desk, Harry twirled a quill around his fingers, he had absolutely no idea where they could find Endelton, half of his team were out looking for any evidence they could find, he was told by Kingsley to stay in his office and await news. Tapping his foot impatiently, his mind wandered to Draco’s prone form laying in the hospital bed. 

Harry didn’t want to go home to their flat without Draco, the very thought made the hairs on the back of his neck prickle. The truth was, there was very little he could do without the blond. Sleeping was definitely one of them. If Harry was being honest with himself, he should’ve told Draco he loved him years ago, the proof was right in front of them.

For Merlin’s sake he couldn’t even sleep without Draco these days. The door to his office banged open, pulling Harry out of his musings. Harry welcomed distraction.

In walked Seamus, his hair sticking to his forehead with sweat. “We think we’ve found Endelton’s location,” he said, panting. It seemed as though Seamus had been running. Harry raised an eyebrow and stood up, brushing his robes off. “First warehouse, we cleared it a while ago and removed the wards, his last known location was about a mile away from it.” Seamus said, passing a piece of parchment towards Harry.

Harry took it eagerly, scanning the document in question before nodding his head. “Right, let’s go then,” he said, exiting his office with Seamus close behind him.

Harry scanned the room and gestured for Lavender, who rose from her chair and jogged towards him. “Sir?” She asked, questioningly. 

“Think we’ve found Endelton, does Hermione need you for anything else?” Harry looked around, not seeing Hermione anywhere, he needed to ask how the interview went but he’d do that when they got back, there was no time for it just now.

Lavender shook her head. “No Sir, the interview was a bust.” Harry nodded. “First warehouse, I’ll apparate in from the East, Seamus if you go for the West ask Dean to do the North, Lavender you go South,” The two of them nodded in agreement. 

“Aye, I’ll go tell Dean.” Seamus looked worried, but Harry had no time to ask.

“Five minutes, I’ll see you there,” Harry said, before jogging out of the department.

****

Harry had sent off a departmental memo to Hermione, explaining where himself and his team intended to go, he’d briefed the Minister quickly. Kingsley looked worried about the entire operation, especially since they were a man down.

In Harry’s breast pocket was an owl from Narcissa, he’d received it about two minutes ago but not yet read it, he needed to be bang on the right time for apparition, he didn’t intend to lose another team member today.

Bang on five minutes, Harry apparated to the coordinates just East of the first warehouse, he could feel his heart begin to beat rapidly in his chest. Quickly taking in his surroundings, the place was deathly silent, not even a bird in the sky. He took note of this quickly, walking slowly towards the warehouse. 

“I need a fucking holiday,” he whispered to himself, shaking his head. Harry hated Auror work now - ever since Draco was admitted to St. Mungos, he had been mentally checking off all the reasons of which he should retire. He’d even come up with an elaborate idea of a little coffee shop he intended to open, making a note of asking Draco to open it with him.

A loud bang from ahead startled Harry, he crouched down behind a bush, eyes darting around to seek out the source of the noise, to the left of him he saw a figure moving, he could barely make out the form of Lavender, who also appeared to be scanning the area.

Advancing quickly, Harry quickly cast an anti-apparation barrier around the warehouse and entered the side door, inside the warehouse was pitch black, he squinted waiting for his eyes to adjust to the new lighting. 

“You’re going to die today, little traitor.” Hissed a man. Harry could hear the thump of a hand connecting with another person, he cringed. Trying to make as little noise as he possibly could, he walked forwards but kicked something as he went.

“Who’s there?!” The voice called. “Lumos!” He shouted, waving his wand around. Harry’s heart was hammering so hard he was sure it was going to burst out of his chest soon, he really wasn’t cut out for Auror work, he was about ready for a full blown panic attack.

“Stupefy!” Came the voice of Lavender, Harry hadn’t even noticed she’d entered the building. Backing up, Harry exited the side door, closing his eyes briefly. The light change dazzled him, he slumped down against the side of the building and took in a deep breath. He could feel the panic rising up in his chest, almost unable to breathe.

“Harry mate, can you hear me?” Asked Dean, who was crouched down to Harry’s left. How long had passed? Minutes? Hours? Harry had no idea. “Don’t worry mate, we’ve got Endelton, breathe,” Dean said, resting a comforting hand on Harry’s shoulder.

Lavender walked through the side door, her eyes resting on Harry. “What’s wrong with him? Is he hit?” She asked frantically. Dean shook his head, patting Harry’s shoulder.

“I think he’s having a panic attack.” He said.

****

Harry had no idea how he ended up in the Auror break room in the Ministry, when he found himself semi coherent he had six sets of eyes looking at him, he looked up sheepishly at the Minister, who had a deeply concerned look on his face.

“Potter,” Kingsley said, eyeing him closely. “Are you alright?” Harry nodded slowly, he attempted to get up but found his legs were like jelly, he let out an exasperated sigh and rubbed his face with his palm. 

“I think so.” Harry mumbled, clearing his throat. His mouth was dry, his head pounding. It wasn’t unusual Harry would get a headache, but this one felt like his head was about ready to explode. “What happened?” he asked, a blush staining his cheeks.

He felt completely useless, back in the warehouse he should have alerted his team, anything could’ve happened to them. The dread of losing another one of his members hit him like a freight train. “Is everyone alright?!” He asked suddenly, looking from each person to confirm they were there.

Stood in front of him was Kingsley, Hermione, Lavender, Dean, Seamus and Wilson. Hermione moved forwards and sat down next to him, laying a hand on his knee. “We got Endelton, he’s bruised and battered but alive, everyone is fine,” she started, a small pained smile appeared on her lips. “Harry, Draco woke up.” she whispered.

Harry’s head snapped towards her, his eyes widening. “I need to go.”


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're close to the end!

As soon as Harry found himself able to stand, he was apparating to St. Mungo’s. The sickly feeling returned as his eyes adjusted to the bright white light of the hospital. Making his way down the corridors with impressive speed, he flew around the corner narrowly missing a Healer, he quickly apologised before slamming through the doors to the ward Draco was currently residing on. Unsure if it was the anxious panic attack he’d had earlier, coupled with the fact he’d hardly eaten anything and a hint of worry for Draco, but he tried to put that all out of his mind.

“He’s awake?” Was the first thing Harry said to Lana. Nodding her head, she gestured towards Draco’s room and smiled. Harry let out a breath of relief as he entered Draco’s room, he was sat up staring out the window, lost in thought, still as pale as he was but alive, _at least_.

“Draco,” Harry said, a little more breathless than he’d expected. He walked towards Draco, placing his hand on the metal bed rail at the foot of the bed. “You’re awake.” He added, lamely. There were a million different thoughts and feelings going through his mind.

The blond looked towards him, a frown on his face, replaced by a soft smile. “Hey,” He said, taking in Harry’s dishevelled appearance. “Are you alright?” He asked, a little concerned. Harry let out a choked laugh, he rounded the bed and immediately wrapped his arms around Draco’s neck, pulling him closely into a tight hug.

“You nearly died and you’re asking me if _I’m_ okay?” He whispered into his neck. The action startled Draco, he wrapped his arms around Harry’s waist and closed his eyes. “Yes,” He replied simply. “You look like shit.” 

Harry let out a choked laugh, unable to hold back the tears that stung his eyes. They fell down his cheeks, pooling on Draco’s neck. “Thanks.” Harry said, he stood holding Draco close for close to ten minutes before the blond pulled back, looking at him with an even more concerned expression than earlier.

“So I’m not dead then,” Draco said, narrowing his eyes. When he’d woken up he had two Healers standing over him with the weirdest expressions on their faces. To start with, Draco was sure he would get a lecture about his past Death Eater activities, or how reckless or idiotic he’d been, but instead they’d immediately looked relieved, checked him over and told him they’d contact Harry Potter. Of course they would, Draco could imagine how the dark haired man would’ve been when he found Draco unconscious.

They’d talked about it in detail once before, what would happen if one of them died in the line of duty almost like a married couple would do. The thought caused Draco’s stomach to flip violently. He could remember the pained expression on Harry’s face as Draco explained things he wanted done on the event of his death, he was sure the man was about to throw up.

“That’s good.” He finally added, he wasn’t sure how long it had taken him to reply, since he woke up he found his mind whirling with different things. It was funny how easily something pieced together when you took a step back and thought about it for a while.

Harry pressed a kiss to Draco’s forehead, then moved towards the seat beside his bed, plonking down into the cushion. Draco began to explain what the Healer’s had told him upon waking up, there wasn’t much of it he really understood. Something to do with curses that tie to your dark mark, some malarkey. To be honest, Harry didn’t care either. The only thing he could think about was taking Draco home, locking him in the flat and then never leaving the safety of their comfortable place again. 

Harry knew it was ridiculous, selfish and unfair but he wasn’t sure how much longer he could take sitting in this ruddy chair. His mind flashed back to the conversation he’d had with the Minister before he’d left to come to the hospital. The Minister had put him on leave, stating he needed time to recover. 

It wasn’t entirely surprising, but he felt like he’d let down his team somehow. They hadn’t gotten much out of Lockwood, there were still Celtic Serpents out there and the crisis was far from over, the Minister was pulling his metaphorical hair out at the prospect of trying to hide this from the media, who seemed dead set on finding out what was going on within the Ministry, especially after being on lockdown.

Draco could almost feel the angst radiating off Harry’s body, he cleared his throat. “Harry, what aren’t you telling me?” he asked, narrowing his eyes. He could tell there was something _definitely_ the matter with the man, but Harry didn’t like worrying other people, which made them worry more.

Harry sighed, looked up at the blond and offered a pained smile. “Kingsley put me on leave, we went to the first warehouse - they had Endelton and er-” He was cut off by the stricken look on Draco’s face. “He’s fine, but I had a panic attack I think, er.. I couldn’t do anything,” he said, a blush staining his cheeks. He ran a hand through his hair and looked down at his thighs.

“I feel like an idiot, but I just clammed up and I went down.” Harry sighed. Draco looked thoughtful, before nodding his head. It was true, both of them worked far too hard. Long hours very rarely with a day off. “Probably for the best,” Draco said, leaning back into his pillows. “I was thinking about resigning.” Draco said honestly, he’d been thinking about it for a while but he wasn’t sure how Harry would feel about it.

“Well it seems we’ve both been thinking about the same thing then.” Harry admitted, letting out a laugh.

****

A few hours later and after extensive demands, Draco was finally released from St. Mungo’s under firm instruction to rest, not to return to work and above all else not to get cursed again. Harry knew he still had a lot to talk about with the other man, especially since he’d not told him about the letter in his pocket. There was so much that could’ve been avoided if he was just honest with Harry, it hurt a little.

“I can’t wait to lay down,” Harry said as they apparated just outside their flat in an alleyway to the right of the building. “I’m knackered.” 

Draco nodded in agreement. They walked up to the door together, Harry lowered the wards and unlocked the door, letting Draco go ahead of him. “Fancy pizza?” asked Harry, walking in after him he locked the door behind him and raised the wards again. Draco frowned at him and walked through the door to the living room.

“Extra wards, paranoia you know?” Harry said, shrugging. Draco nodded again. Harry was a little worried at how quiet the other man seemed to be. “So pizza?” he repeated. “Sure.” Draco replied, walking towards the kitchen, he opened the cupboard and pulled out all the snacks he’d bought previously, laying them on the counter.

Harry didn’t even bother with their usual argument on who would phone, he just picked the phone up and ordered the pizza. He knew he needed to talk to Draco about everything, but somehow he couldn’t bring himself to do it, it wasn’t like Draco to be this quiet, instead Harry sat down on the sofa and waited. 

Draco wandered over to the sofa and sat down beside Harry, throwing his snacks onto the coffee table. Chewing his lower lip in thought, he turned his head towards Harry and took in a deep breath, exhaling slowly. “I don’t think it was the paper that cursed me,” he said, knitting his brows together. “The box, the one in my father's vault, I felt something on it, I used wards but if it was blood magic it would’ve gotten through.” he said. 

Harry raised an eyebrow, he nodded slowly. “So that would mean Lockwood had nothing to do with you being in hospital, right?” He knew this was the case, but he wanted verbal confirmation nonetheless. “I mean we have a lot on him in terms of the Celtic Serpents, but obviously one of the main charges is to do with your curse.” Harry pursed his lips thoughtfully, frowning. 

Draco nodded, he shifted closer and brought his knees up to his chest, resting his head against Harry’s chest. “I’m going to talk to Hermione, she’s probably the best person to talk about this to,” Draco sighed, he ran a hand through his hair. Draco knew what that particular curse was, it turned the victims vital organs to mush, extremely slowly, extremely painfully. When he’d explained it to Healer Jenkins she’d cringed, nodding her head in agreement. There really wasn’t a name for it in particular, but his father had liked to call it Muggle Sludge, they’d primarily used it on Muggles who concluded the deaths were organ failure. 

“So I guess I get to watch documentaries on dolphins, pharaohs and what was it? Sad doggies needing rescuing?” Draco said quietly, a smirk appearing on his lips. Draco was barely conscious but he’d heard Harry talking. When he’d asked the Healers, they couldn’t explain it - other than perhaps they’d caught it very quickly.

Draco could hear Harry’s heart speed up, the other man looked down at Draco, a blush staining his tanned cheeks. “Ah, er, yeah,” Harry said lamely, narrowing his eyes. “I was worried.” Harry cleared his throat, wrapping an arm around Draco’s waist. 

Draco smiled, picking the remote up from the arm of the sofa he pressed the button to turn it on and let out a sigh. “Well, there better be something good on then.”

After scrolling through various different channels, Draco rested on another documentary, this one about Polar Bears. As it happened it was very interesting. Draco’s eyes widened as he learnt the Polar Bears natural habitat was melting. Harry could see the tears forming in the blond’s eyes when they explained a lot of the bears were dying as they didn’t find enough to eat before they went into their long hibernation. It never failed to amuse Harry, other people expected Draco to be this cold and callous Slytherin, with no compassion and no love. 

Draco was entirely the opposite, he had a lot of compassion and his love of animals was unparalleled. He’d been hassling Harry for the better part of a year about getting a cat, but every time he’d ask Harry would mention they didn’t spend enough time in their flat - the cat would be lonely.

Pulled out of his musings, Harry looked towards the front door as the doorbell rang. “Pizza,” Harry smiled, he nudged Draco who shifted away slightly. Standing up, Harry made his way to the front door, looked through the peephole before opening the door. Draco quickly cast an accio to a blanket from the bedroom and wrapped it around his body, smiling gratefully as Harry returned to the sofa with two boxes of Domino’s pizza.

“Cold?” Harry asked, placing the boxes down on the coffee table, he opened the lids and pulled the sauces out of the cut out holes. “Yeah, it’s freezing in here,” Draco moaned, shaking his head. “We need to keep the bloody heating on.” he said, picking up a slice of pizza. 

Harry nodded in agreement, he wandered over to the heater on the back wall of the living room and turned the dial. “Should come on soon,” he smiled, returning to the sofa. Once sat down, Draco shifted closer to him and pulled the blanket over the other man, covering almost the entirety of his body.

“Harry,” Draco said, his voice a little unsteady. Harry raised an eyebrow and turned his head towards Draco, noting that they were indeed just inches away from each other. “I wondered..” 

Harry watched him intently, they’d been this close together before - but it had never felt like this before. He could see all of the flecks in Draco’s eyes, all of the marks and blemishes on his face, he smiled.

“Yeah?” he asked, but he really wasn’t paying attention - looking down at Draco’s lips they were perfect, it hadn’t been the first time Harry thought about kissing Draco, but he’d never come this close to actually _doing_ it before.

Draco bit his lip, acutely aware of how close he was to telling Harry the truth. His heart began to beat rapidly in his chest, his palms clammy under the fleece blanket. He placed his hand on Harry’s chest. ‘Just a little closer’ he thought.

“I love you.” Draco said, mustering as much courage as he could. It was obvious, he’d loved Harry for a long time but the idiot was oblivious at the best of times. Harry took in a sharp intake of breath, before his face split into a wide grin. 

“Really?” He asked, tightening his hold on Draco’s waist. Draco narrowed his eyes, feeling his cheeks flush. “Yes,” He squeaked, ducking his head down. Harry put his hand under Draco’s chin and tilted his head up towards him, grin still plastered on his face.

“I love you too.” Harry said, leaning forwards he pressed his lips to Draco’s, the blond’s eyes widened, he smiled against Harry’s lips his eyes drifting closed.

Should’ve almost died years ago, Draco thought.


End file.
